Book ''3'^ 

Copyright 1^? 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



Plate I. Excelsarose: "A wonderful grower . . . it blooms 
late." (See page 93.) 



MY GROWING 
GARDEN 



BY 

J. HORACE McFARLAND 

AUTHOR OF "getting ACQUAINTED WITH THE TREES ' 

"photographing flowers and trees" 
"planting the home grounds" 
etc. 



ILLUSTRATED WITH 
PHOTOGRAPHS BY THE AUTHOR AND 
ROBERT B. McFARLAND 



J^eto gorfe 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd. 

1915 

All rights reserved 



COPYHIGHT, 1915 

By the MACMILLAN COMPANY 



Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1915 



J. Horace McFarland Comp:ui7 
Harrisburg, Pa. 

• ©ciA4i6018 

OCT 2! 1915 



TO THE OTHER THREE 
OF THE ''FAMILY FOUR'* WHO LIVE IN 
THIS GROWING GARDEN 



PREFACE 



FOR many gardenless years I had been reading 
of gardens, and not seldom seeing some of 
them. The reading was mostly of the greater 
gardens, the appearance of which more often 
reflected the personal taste of the designer or the 
gardener than the garden -love of the owner. 
Indeed, the very sight of some gardens was irrita- 
ting, because of their expensive elaboration. 

In one notable instance, the great formal garden 
I repeatedly visited contained no suggestion of its 
owner, and I came to think of it in the name of the 
soft-voiced Scotchman who kept it growing and 
glowing. In another garden, of which I kept for 
some time a photographic record, the owner was 
unsympathetic, unrelated; he was doing a garden 
as part of his spending job as a rich man. 

But one garden that I saw told another story. 
It had been started lovingly more than a gener- 
ation before by a fine-spirited clergyman. With 
his own hands he planted in it, and his daughter, 
who lived in it when I visited it, was adding her 
ideals to those of her father in that yet growing 
garden. This seemed altogether worth while. 

When it came my time to have a garden, it 

(vii) 



viii 



PREFACE 



seemed right that my garden should grow in my 
way, mainly by my own endeavor. Incidentally, 
and fortunately, it also was necessary that it should 
so grow, if at all, for financial reasons ! 

This garden — my garden, our garden — has 
grown for a half-dozen years under these con- 
ditions. It has been my golf, in pleasurable exer- 
cise; it has been my open-air school, in what it 
has taught me; it has been my physical regener- 
ation from the debility of overwork. 

It is only proper to mention the unusual con- 
ditions surrounding the making of this book. I 
have written it, but my family have hved it with 
me, and the print-shop which bears my name and 
enjoys my garden has made of the book much 
more than a perfunctory item of work. The pub- 
lishers, too, have let down all the bars, so that in 
a very special sense the book has been Hved, 
written, designed, illustrated, printed, and bound 
as the work of one man and those about him. 
Whatever it is, therefore — and I am keenly con- 
scious of its faults — it is mine, or ours; it is of the 
man, the family, and the shop. 

J. H. McF. 

September 28, 1915 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. January: The Place and the Prospect . . 1 

II. February: The Planning and the Catalogues 13 

III. March: Getting into the Ground .... 27 

rV. April: Planting of All Sorts, and Some 

Results 49 

V. May: Spring Buds and Blooms .... 69 

VI. June: The Feast of Flowers 87 

VII. July: The Feast of Vegetables ..... 105 

Vin. August: Sober Summer 123 

IX. September: Good Things to Eat — Fine 

Thmgs to See 143 

X. October: The Early Fall Glory .... 157 

XI. In Between: Choosing Your Own Weeds . 173 

XII. November: Putting the Garden to Sleep . 185 

XIII. December: Retrospect and Prospect . . . 197 

Index 211 

Cix) 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



COLORED PLATES 

PAGE 

The sun-dial Insert on cover 

Excelsarose: "A wonderful grower . . . it blooms late." (I) . 

Frontis'piece 

"The forsythia ... its yellow bells are shaking ... At the 

foot there blooms a crescent of Golden Spur narcissus." (X) 65 

"An ounce of Shirley poppy seed . . . sowed along an eighty- 
foot border ... in mid-June came days of poppy glory." 
(XVIII) . 97 

"The giant zinnias are really gorgeous . . . The crescent border 

. . . glows with their stately flowers." (XXIX) . . .156 

SEPIA PLATES 

"The great old sycamore showed greater with the snow about it." 

(II) 1 

"The marvelous elasticity of the arborvitses under a great load of 

chnging whiteness." (Ill) 9 

"One winter day of hoar-frost . . . the delicacy of the twigs of 
the young linden." (IV) 16 

"A carriage approach from the west." . . . "My son has 

acquired a pair of ski." (V) 20 

"A rain that froze around every twig . . . showed how beautiful 
the Thunberg barberry hedge can become when it blooms in 
crystal." (VI) 29 

"March is passing . . . The crocuses are likely to pop open 

suddenly." (VII) 44 

(xi) 



xii ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACINQ 
PAGB 

"Tree surgery . . . This tree was the 'sickest* . . . now 

growing most vigorously and happily." (VIII) .... 53 

"April is a daffodil month . . . The driveway crescent border 

glows now in Emperor." (IX) 60 

"In a warm April rain . . . under the Norway maple at the 
west end." (XI) 68 

"The loveliness of the horse-chestnut's foot-long panicle." (XII) 72 

"The apple blooms . . . the spraying game." (i) Not open; too 
soon, (ii) Wide open, not fertilized; too soon, (iii) Calyx 
open and relaxed; just right for spraying, (iv) Calyx yet open; 
still right. (XIII) .77 

"The axis walk a wonder of bloom and foliage . . . always a 
picture vista." (XIV) 81 

"A gracious wealth of bloom on . . . this same blackberry row." 

(XV) 84 

Leuchstem rose: . . , "its bloom has been copious, exquisite, 

enduring." (XVI) 89 

The rose hedge in June: Lady Gay on left. Climbing American 

Beauty on right. (XVII) 93 

Iris: "The unique and delightful Japanese sort." (XIX) . . 100 

"The Japanese honeysuckle . . . has flung its branches and 

tendrils over a tree-stump." (XX) 104 

"A garden of vegetables is a beautiful thing, if it is a good garden." 

(XXI) 109 

"Considerthehollyhock;howit grows!" (XXII) . . . . 113 

"At the beginning of the month the great rhododendron is in full 

bloom." (XXIII) 117 

"My dwarf fruit trees have grown more than generously." (XXIV) 124 

"The China asters . . . especially the King sorts that reign 

over the border along the axis walk." (XXV) .... 128 

The formal garden in August. (XXVI) 132 



ILLUSTRATIONS xiii 

FACINQ 

"One of the pear trees flattened out against the espalier has ^^^^ 
on it . . . some beautiful fruits." (XXVII) ...» 141 

**The 'white snakeroot' . . . the absurd common name to 

Eupatorium ageratoides." (XXVIII) 152 

"The stately . . . Japanese anemones are at their best." 
(XXX) 161 

"Celery just humping itself these cool nights." (XXXI) . . . 168 

"Sunday-school girls, mostly from gardenless homes . . . dehght 
in the flowers." (XXXII) 176 

"The long border of nicotiana and African marigold ... is now 

in perfection." (XXXIII) 185 

"On either side the garden entrance a fine red cedar." (XXXIV) 193 

"The barberry hedge, now purely lovely . . . The rhododen- 
drons, snow-bound, look happy." (XXXV) . . . . .200 

"The fruit-garden, looking clean and trim . . . The rose-arbor 

: ... thick with this cUnging snow." (XXXVI) . . .208 



Plate II. "The great old sycamore showed greater with the snow 
about it." (See page 11.) 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



CTUALLY, we — that means the family four 



of us — are to have a real outdoor garden! 



Not a ''handkerchief" garden, in a white- 
fenced, shaded back yard, such as has mocked us 
for nearly twenty years, but a garden with borders, 
and beds, and walks, and maybe a sundial; to 
say nothing of a possible lily-pond, a longed-for 
rose-hedge, a dreamed-of orchard of dwarf fruit 
trees. 

And it has happened suddenly, too, this garden 
prospect. Tired of the close-by asphalted street, 
wearied of the twenty hours of trolley cars that 
banged past every five minutes not forty feet from 
our very ears as we went through the motions of 
sleep, we were looking abroad for the place of our 
dreams — a garden place. Twice our hopes of a 
half -acre had been shattered; first by the sheer 
cruelty of the hard-hearted real-estate man's price- 
demand, when we found that old apple orchard 



CHAPTER I— JANUARY 



THE PLACE AND THE PROSPECT 




A 



(1) 



2 MY GROWING GARDEN 



next the park; and again when our two friends had 
decHned to settle with us away from immediate 
gas and electricity, from the city mail dehvery 
and the water main. 

Then came the sight of the httle place, not at 
all the garden-place of our dreams, but a ''prac- 
ticable" lot of sixty-five feet front in a pleasant 
neighborhood, on which we might at least have a 
little room outside the home walls. Inquiry of a 
friendly real-estate man as to values followed, and 
also, glory be ! his suggestion that we ''look at the 
old H place." 

Look we did, and we found, that dull Novem- 
ber day, a tangle of tall grass and taller weeds, 
drifted leaves, dead pear trees and a dingy-looking 
old "mansion-house." But also there were pines 
and hemlocks about, splendid maples and horse- 
chestnuts, and a glorious old giant of a sycamore. 
A long arborvitae hedge — several hedges, in fact — 
rambled across the place, near the slope on which 
had fallen from their trelhses old, old grape-vines, 
rehcs of a famous vineyard. 

Somber was the look of things outdoors that 
day, and worse indoors — but this is not a house 
story. I had "the surprise of my life" when the 
two ladies of the family, smelling the sweet odors of 
the autumn fohage, feeling the touch of wet hem- 



THE PLACE AND THE PROSPECT 3 



lock boughs as they walked about under the 
drooping evergreens, agreed that this was right 
for a home, regardless of what might be inside those 
shuttered French windows. The outdoors had 
called, and we, city-tired, were answering accord- 
ing to our blood. 

I have often thought, since, of that first day, 
and of the good fortune that was ours in coming to 
"the place" under the most depressing conditions, 
in the worst weather of that season which Bryant 
■ — who must have had mental malaria at times — 
calls melancholy. Melancholy! We couldn't find 
reason then, nor have we ever found reason since, 
for melancholia concerning the passage of any of 
the seasons here at Breeze Hill. Even that first 
winter was certainly a season of loveliness. Never 
a day but brought its own beauty in the trees, of 
sky and cloud, even of rain and fog, of frost and 
wind. The snow was always making pictures for 
us, on the pines and hemlocks, along the hedges 
and plants; and the occasional sleet outlined more 
completely the lovehness and the symmetry of the 
tree twigs. 

And if I may exercise the writer's privilege of 
sudden change of time, I can say now, after a half- 
dozen growing-garden years, that spring and sum- 
mer are each a new joy, each always better than 



4 MY GROWING GARDEN 



any other season ever was until the insensible pas- 
sage into the *^melancholy" autumn sets us tingling 
with color joy in the happy maturity of leaves 
and twigs, and shows us nature's color balance 
of warmth for winter and "coolth" for summer. 
Then we are sure that autumn is the best of all. 
We see how the honeysuckle holds its glossy green 
robe right through the frosts which bring down 
the golden shower of horse-chestnut leaves; we 
enjoy the berry brightness on the dogwoods and 
the persistence of the chrysanthemums; we watch 
the thermometer leaves of the big rhododendrons, 
and we have learned to pick out the promise of 
those fat, sumptuous buds on the lilacs, the for- 
sythias, the deutzias and spireas, that are all 
ready for the spring show, not so many weeks 
ahead. Melancholy? We don't see it, or feel it, or 
know it, here at Breeze Hill, in this growing 
garden. 

Now I've named It, though it was my much 
better half who did it first. It is the right name, 
for we are on a hill, and surely the breezes that 
reach us come straight from the distant mountains, 
not often touching the rising smoke and dust of 
the city a hundred feet lower. At first, we had a 
whimsical reason for the name, in that a change 
of but its first letter would be required to make it 



THE PLACE AND THE PROSPECT 5 



fit the arctic predictions of our city-bound friends. 
But it has never been "Freeze Hill!'* 

This is to be a story of the growing garden, and 
it begins in the month of first possession, the 
snowy Christmas month. What is the place, and 
what the prospect? 

The place had been rather aptly described to us 
as "two acres of San Jose scale with a house 
attached." In addition to the scale, there were in 
sight weeds, and weeds, and more weeds, but now 
the snow has made fiowers of their aftermath. Of 
garden there is nothing, and the street plan upon 
which access depends predicates grading that will 
probably mean much raw soil, scantily arable. 
The trees are noble, but neglected and dilapidated. 
There are no walks save those that will have to be 
changed, and back of a great old arborvitse hedge 
are the fallen ruins of a greenhouse and an ice- 
house — which we cannot hope to restore. 

One or two Norway maples that had been 
planted have, through years of neglect, estabhshed 
everywhere thousands of their seedHngs from an 
inch to twenty feet in height, sometimes sucking 
dry and killing portions of the great evergreen 
hedge, and sometimes just impudently declaring 
an intention to entirely possess the land. The 
once fine old pear orchard is dead, dead, of San 



6 MY GROWING GARDEN 



Jose scale, save only two trees. The tremendous 
old lilacs have been mutilated for their flowering 
branches every spring of untenancy by the law- 
less, and are as well thickly coated with another 
no less hateful parasite, the oyster-shell scale; but 
they are ahve! There are gnarled quinces that 
look as if fruit could not come, and the nearly 
as much gnarled grape-vines that make up the 
most of the planted growth are said to be rich in 
root-knot, and to be worthless. Where I dug into 
the soil before frost sealed it, I found little depth 
of ground fit for a garden above the heavy shale 
that characterizes this neighborhood. 

Here and there a pipe, or a stump, or a heap of 
stones denotes some long-gone feature of the 
mansion-house surroundings. Several great locusts 
tower near the foundation remains of the burned 
barn. There must have been some sort of a foun- 
tain here in front of the house, and there remain 
several forlorn old terra-cotta vases on wobbly 
foundations. Of the seven horse-chestnuts that 
too closely environ the house, six are more or less 
decayed as a consequence of splitting. The two 
branches into which each main stem was permitted 
to separate thirty-five years ago have not had 
strength to hold against the snow-loads, and a 
little crack in the crotch has widened until it 



THE PLACE AND THE PROSPECT 7 



is now a serious opening, which, may probably 
mean decay in the trunk. 

Discouraging, all this? Not at all; for here 
are these same trees that time has matured into dig- 
nified beauty and efficient shelter; here is such a 
varied contour, such a succession of natural divi- 
sions by tree and hedge and house and approach, 
that the relative largeness of the place is at once 
apparent, or, to be honestly accurate, was apparent 
not to my desk-dulled eyes, but to the acute 
vision of my landscape-engineer friend, who early 
came to look at my purchase and quickly saw how 
very big were these particular two acres, and 
what they might become as a garden. He saw 
that the natural vertical axis of the place was 
through the selected living-room of the house and 
along the center of the garden-to-be, and that a 
horizontal axis could readily be created at a proper 
intersection. He it was who gave me courage to 
cut away some trees that the better ones might 
be yet better, and whose own great skill suggested 
the development which has made the new plant- 
ings fit the old trees and shrubs so that maturity 
has seemed to go right along with that same 
planting. 

I have had very many reasons to be thankful 
for friends, and none more potent than for the 



8 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



friendly professional aid of a man whose mind and 
heart are so full of the glory of the land and what 
grows on it that he plants garden poems and builds 
park epics right along. And I have, too, reason to 
pity the unfortunates who try to make a garden 
home by the T-square method, or who have it 
*'sent in" ready made, without any clear ideal of 
developing the individuality that every bit of 
God's green earth can hold. Both a home, and a 
garden, and much more a garden-home like Breeze 
Hill, deserve the better treatment of individual 
thought, preferably aided by consultation with a 
good landscape architect, or engineer, or designer, 
or whatever these fine men call themselves. And 
any such place will reward its owner who loves it 
and patiently works with it; reward him with a 
true garden individuality all its own. 

If this may be done, there will be less tiresome 
monotony and less thoughtless duplication of 
plants. Gardens will not be mere repetitions of 
hydrangea and golden glow, but will show the 
taste and knowledge and ideals of the makers of 
them. 

It may easily be seen, by now, that I am plan- 
ning for a garden that shall be my own, in the 
sense of ideals; but that shall also be saved by 
reliance upon skilled advice from the errors I might 




Plate III. "The nuirvelous elasticity of the arborvitses under a 
great load of clinging whiteness." (See page 10.) 



THE PLACE AND THE PROSPECT 9 



make. It needs also to be made apparent to the 
reader that my growing garden is not to grow on 
gold, of which I have little, but rather on my own 
growth into that real garden knowledge which is 
found only with the spade and the rake, and 
amongst the seeds and plants and bulbs and roots 
and vines of American hardiness. My readers, 
therefore, may expect to find confession of defi- 
ciencies and failures, and of difficulties due to the 
lack of funds to rapidly accomplish my ambitions. 
They will have little trouble, I think, in perceiving 
that I now regard the failures and the lack of funds 
as blessings not at all disguised, because they have 
caused me to get more health, happiness and "fun" 
out of my garden hours, and to make my garden's 
growth more precious to me and mine. It is surely 
true in growing a garden that there is a far greater 
reward to the worker who personally strives for a 
result, eyes open to nature's wonderful ways of 
doing things, than is possible to be had by one 
who has merely waved the fairy wand of wealth, 
with a presto ! but not worked-for result. Indeed, 
it is seemingly almost as hard for just money to 
make a garden that is home-like as it was for that 
camel of long ago to thread himself through the 
allegorical needle ! 

Those early winter days, when I escaped from 



10 MY GROWING GARDEN 



the call of the carpenters who were renewing the 
old house, gave me vast benefit. I knew about 
snow, of course — had I not shoveled my own side- 
walk part of the time for a score of years? But I 
had forgotten some of the snow-happenings about 
niy boyhood's garden home, so that the marvelous 
elasticity of the seemingly stiff arborvitses under 
a great load of chnging whiteness was new to me, 
as I waded about, lifting here and shaking there 
to see the branches spring to position as released 
from their snow burden. 

Twenty years of walking on city streets gave 
me no preparation for the sheer beauty of the 
walk through a foot of virgin snow, with the after- 
noon sun sending blue sky-shadows into every 
footprint. The outlining in snow of the lovely 
reverse curves of the branches on the western big 
horse-chestnut showed me anew what tree archi- 
tecture means. 

I made acquaintance, one winter day of hoar- 
frost, with the dehcacy of the twigs of the sturdy 
young linden, and with the green plumes of the 
Norway spruce nearby. Curiously enough, I 
passed without seeing it a fine persimmon, which 
I presume was loaded then as it has been since 
with delicious fruit. Those same scraggly quinces 
which looked so forlorn in November took on a 



THE PLACE AND THE PROSPECT 11 



new possibility when their branches were cased in 
crystal, for no fruiting could more completely 
justify their existence. 

And the great old sycamore showed greater 
with the snow about it than it had when leaves 
instead carpeted the ground. Those days indeed 
gave me the prospect of the growing garden, while 
they showed me the loveliness of the snow garden 
that came into bloom in a night. The open space 
about — ^how it stirred me! I would — and did — 
shout for the joy of it all, and no one looked on me 
as insane; while had I raised my voice half so loud 
in rejoicing on the twenty-foot lot of my street- 
front home, some astonished neighbor might prop- 
erly have telephoned for a policeman, or set on 
foot rumors of doubt as to my Hfe-long abstinence 
from alcohol. 

So I face this January the garden prospect. The 
items are as they have been above set down, but 
may be here summarized as including perhaps 
twenty fine trees, some hundreds of feet of old 
arborvitse hedges, some scores of ancient grape- 
vines, some half-dozen great old Hlacs, some slopes 
of weedy land, a flat expanse of raw and seemingly 
barren shale. The incidental detriments of broken- 
down outbuildings, and the interloping bushes 
and misplaced trees that had prospered during 



n MY GROWING GARDEN 



years of neglect, may be disregarded. The scanty 
pocket-book that had to stand for the prospects 
ahead cannot be disregarded; it is to be care- 
fully conserved, so that it may answer imperative 
demands for garden necessities. There is a hope 
that the things we may grow to eat on this land 
will make possible an occasional transfer from the 
household account to the garden budget. 

Lest I forget, the shape of the place must be 
here set down : it is almost exactly a quarter-circle 
of a radius of four hundred feet. In my joy I call 
it my Breeze Hill piece of pie! And it slopes 
gently toward the south and east and west from 
the noble clump of Norway spruces that hold off 
much of the fierceness of winter's storms. 

The place and a little of the prospect are before 
us, to work out in the months of the years that 
God gives us. 



CHAPTER II— FEBRUARY 



THE PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 

THIS fine February day — a day of white sky 
over the white snow, of a clear cold that 
has just a hint of the growing strength of 
the sun back of it— I found "Old WiUiam" deftly 
working fruit off the upper branches of that per- 
simmon tree I had not noticed at all the first 
winter of acquaintance with Breeze Hill. The old 
man had spHced together two long clothes-props, 
and with the uplifted end he could tickle off the 
wrinkled persimmons that were by now surely free 
from any astringency. The sight tempted me, and 
my younger legs were good for the simple climb 
that took me up where I could pick, eat and truly 
enjoy a fruit which to most Americans who live 
in the northern states is merely a tradition of 
their boyhood. 

I have been wondering why the hybridizers 
have not worked some of the size and mildness of 
the big Japanese "kaki" into this delicious morsel 
of the north, and the inquiry born of that wonder 
is answered to the purport that the much larger 

(13) 



14 MY GROWING GARDEN 



Nipponese fruit seemingly will not mix or "cross" 
or hybridize with our native persimmon. It is not 
recorded that Burbank has ever tried to bring 
together these two fruits in a union that easily 
might produce a result of great economic value; 
but then Burbank has not done much that is of 
any real use to any climate outside of California, 
and the spectacular seems to appeal to him much 
more strongly than the useful. Sometime, how- 
ever, the union will be made, and we shall have a 
fruit somewhat larger than this shapeless mass of 
juicy pulp I am eating, with, let us hope, at least 
a portion of its exquisite wild tang. 

There are two of the persimmon trees, but only 
one has fruited. Both have the distinct habit of 
the genus so clearly outlined in even these trees 
that are probably not over twenty-five years old, 
and which in the years of their maturity will make 
them splendidly effective. 

I have discovered another treasure not far 
from the persimmons — sl fine, shapely mulberry, 
surely old enough to bear. Truly my growing 
garden has surprises ! 

But now is the time for garden planning, so 
that later we may plant with order and certainty. 
While the hedges and the paths impose certain 
lines, in general the garden may be what we like. 



PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 15 



This liking must be modified, however, to what 
my check-book will properly back up with cash. 
Therefore, and certainly, some things will not be 
there! My dream has not included great exotic 
rhododendrons like those at Wellesley, nor has it 
compassed the lovely magnolias I would be glad 
to see blooming among these evergreens, and in 
contrast to their sohd color. 

But I can have dogwoods and red-buds, and 
they are going to be planted where I can see them 
against the green of the high hedge of old arbor- 
vitses. Then I will eventually come to see in the 
May time a home bit of the exquisite picture that 
I have often visited along the almost unknown 
Conodoguinet creek, where God certainly planted 
a garden, good enough for any Adam, in or out of 
Eden. And nearby, also with the evergreen back- 
ground, there must be some more of that same 
slope of the Conodoguinet, in bits of Phlox divari- 
cata^ Mertensia virginica, Dutchman's breeches, 
bloodroot, May-apple and the other friends of 
my spring rambles. Perhaps I may even compass 
some of the great trillium, that woods aristocrat, 
which vies with the cotton flower of the South in 
its change of color in the same bloom, from purest 
white to a lovely blush-pink as the days mature it. 

There will be other shrubs, of course, so that I 



16 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



may have a succession of bloom all through the 
spring and summer. Certain old flower friends 
must meet me in the garden, but its invisible gate 
shall be barred against that gross hydrangea, the 
flowers of which hang on until the once white 
panicles blush into dirty pink and turn a corpse- 
like green, and which is planted as if it was the 
only shrub available in America. I will have 
hydrangeas, but the worth-while ones only — ^the 
plain paniculata and the oak-leaved one; the 
beautiful radiata, with its leaves silvered beneath; 
and the showy form of arborescens which loves 
half-shade and blooms early. 

I shall prefer for admission here the native 
shrubs, and especially those native to Pennsyl- 
vania. Of course it will not do to overlook some 
of the fine exotics that the plant-collectors have 
sent us from over the seas, particularly from Japan 
and China, like certain snowballs and spireas; but 
I want the home place to reflect the home state. 
Those dogv^^oods and red-buds will be of 'Tenn's 
Woods," surely enough; and the great old syca- 
more which distinguishes the place is a native tree, 
naturally planted. The arborvitses belong to the 
Atlantic coast, and these white pines and hem- 
locks are of the hills and valleys of this state, 
reminiscent to me of my summer home at lovely 




Plate IV. "One winter day of hoar-frost . . . the dehcacy of 
the twigs of the young Hnden." (See page 10.) 



PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 17 



Eagles Mere, with its grandly beautiful primeval 
forest. 

The Norway spruces are not of America, and 
here they show it; for the older trees are becoming 
bedraggled, as might be expected when they are 
called upon to endure the vicissitudes of a climate 
with a variation of over a hundred degrees in 
annual temperature, instead of the lesser variations 
of the central European hills from whence it comes. 
These dominating horse-chestnuts, however, can 
hardly be happier on their own native Grecian 
slopes than they are here, or more beautiful in 
bloom; wherefore it may be that the leaf -dropping 
trees stand the change to America better than 
those we call evergreen. 

Most of us, famihar as we are from early child- 
hood with its spring sweetness, consider the com- 
mon lilac as belonging to America, of course. 
Instead, we owe it to Bulgaria; and the many 
"improved" varieties of it are of French origin, 
while other and quite different hlacs come from 
various parts of Asia, with none at all native to 
America. The big, rugged, picturesque old hlac 
clumps at Breeze Hill may therefore remind me 
of the Balkans, if I can for a moment forget the 
similar plants that were a lovely feature at my old 
home along the Susquehanna. 



18 MY GROWING GARDEN 



But I want here in this garden more of the 
Pennsylvania good things that bloom; just as I 
should, I hope, prefer to have an Ohio garden, if I 
lived in that state of presidents, or a Massachusetts 
garden if I inhabited that very particular form of 
existence. I often wonder why people will con- 
tinually plant monkey gardens, imitating some- 
thing from somewhere else! I have seen the 
futile struggle for blue-grass lawns in Fort Worth, 
with the richly velvety Bermuda grass belonging 
comfortably there; and I have been angered at the 
folly of transplanting Newport and Bar Harbor to 
St. Augustine and Miami in the gardens provided 
around the hotels for the painfully rich. My dis- 
position, therefore, for a home-state garden here 
is rooted in odious comparisons. 

I see places here for some native rhododendrons 
and some laurels from our hillsides; and I am 
hoping these can be invited within my price range, 
for they will not be so financially repellent as the 
haughty hybrids "made in Belgium." The soil of 
this garden is without any hmestone character, 
and if I can gather or get some. of nature's compost 
or *'leaf-mold," I ought to be able to have some- 
thing worth while in these ericaceous plants, 
"collected" from the woods. Parenthetically, I 
wish the catalogue men would tell what they 



PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 19 



know about soils, when a plant they sell will simply 
die in ground uncongenial to it. 

There are on the place some plants of the native 
elder, a lovely though neglected shrub, esteemed 
more for its shining black berries than for its 
broad cymes of creamy white flowers, which come 
between spring and summer. So I will have this 
relative of the native viburnums or snowballs to 
start a collection with, that I hope will in good 
time give me bloom nearly from frost to frost, 
twig colors to brighten the winter days as well, and 
that will make my garden grow into a live and 
changing museum of the flora of Pennsylvania. 

Of course roses are to be in, and of, and about, 
this garden; and I'll have to accept many not native 
to America. A rose-hedge about the whole place 
I wanted, but I have been word-persuaded and 
pocket-convinced that I was wrong. There will 
be a rose-fence, to separate two parts of the 
"formal" garden, south of the long arborvitse 
hedge; and I see ahead a rose-arbor built of the 
completely weathered and long-enduring locust 
posts that the passing vineyard has left about the 
place. Rose-borders there must be, and I surely 
will have the great Rugosa hybrids that are 
pointing the way to a new race of rugged ever- 
bloomers. 



20 MY GROWING GARDEN 



This old mansion-house was the operating 
center of a farm of hundreds of acres, and could 
afford an encircling road about the home. But 
now with only two acres, such a road would bite 
too deeply into the lawn that must give repose 
and dignity to the house. A carriage approach 
from the new street on the west is therefore part 
of Mr. Manning's plan, and I have been staking 
it out these February days, finding the ground 
unfrozen under the snow that has given us days 
of good sleighing. 

A February variation has appeared to my 
husky son, who has acquired a pair of skees, or 
more precisely ski, on which at first he tumbled 
entertainingly, but with which now he skims the 
new-fallen snow, and scales the hills which give us 
a changing vista each day. And while my fifty- 
year bones are not ski-inclined, I am rejoiced that 
by proxy I am thus freed from the trammels of 
street and sidewalk, because we are in and 
growing a garden. 

To hurry our sight of flowers in spring we have 
placed a modest coldframe in a sheltered spot, 
where in these sunny February days we get a 
glimpse now and then of a violet, and see the 
readiness to grow of the pansies, campanulas, fox- 
gloves and other carried-over perennials. We have 




Plate V. "A carriage approach from the west." . . . "M}' son 
has acquired a pair of ski." (See page 20.) 



PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 21 



been anticipating spring, too, by cutting some 
twigs off the great old forsythia bushes, which 
after two or three days in the water-filled vases, 
and in a dark place, and two weeks more in what- 
ever sunshine we have — ^yet in the vases, of course 
— are shaking their golden bells for us, just as 
brightly as their outdoor sister twigs will do in 
mid-April. It is a pleasant foretaste of the spring 
feast of flowers, and easily obtained. 

Even in January the catalogues called to me, 
and now I know I must settle down to conclusions, 
so that orders may go to the seedsmen and the 
plantsmen whose aid we invoke. This catalogue 
lure is an old one, but it is a perennial surprise 
that I should never acquire immunity to it. As 
may without much difficulty be ascertained, I 
print catalogues for a living, and thus I truly live 
with them every work-day in the year. Just now 
I am in thankfulness that the recurrent push to 
have the seedsmen satisfied in January has been 
met; yet I turn to the pages of these books, as 
some of them are, with as much garden zest as if 
I had not worried for months to get them ready. 
It is, I suppose, a sort of automatic change of 
personality that happens, when I cease to see the 
catalogue as a printer and begin to gloat over its 
offerings as a garden maker. 



1 



n MY GROWING GARDEN 



So now comes the delightful difficulty of it all ! 
I want everything new and fine that is offered; but 
I know quite well that I have neither room nor 
reason for all these "novelties." And also I know 
as well that not all of them will turn out in my 
garden exactly as they are described; which is, I 
presume, one of the best reasons in the world for 
adventuring into the trial of them. It is a fasci- 
nating gamble, a fair game of chance; and even if I 
draw less prizes than I hope for, I shall have had 
the anticipation of prizes and the satisfaction of 
trying for them. So it is, paraphrasing in my 
garden philosophy, better to have tried and lost 
than never to have tried at all. In fact, I am sure 
to win something, even if the sweet peas are not 
go many inches across, the petunias so wonderfully 
blotched, the asters larger than a respectable chry- 
santhemum, and if those phenomenal South African 
annuals fail to germinate at all. 

Just here there comes into sight an advantage 
I possess that accounts in part for the drawing 
power of these annually recurring novelties that 
are thus so alluringly offered in the front pages of 
the catalogues. I know how some novelties, at 
least, happen, and why these are thus for sale. My 
acquaintance with these honestly hopeful gentle- 
men of the seed-stores has not in a generation 



PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 23 



served to give me doubt of their good faith. Con- 
sider, for instance, this new celery that one seeds- 
man is exploiting as better than "the best ever.'* 
It happens that I am acquainted with the acute 
and successful market-gardener who selected this 
"sport" in a field of good celery, watched it, grew 
it to seedage, planted it again and again, with 
renewed selections toward a high ideal, evolving 
at last a "type," or "strain," of celery quite 
definitely better than anything that had preceded 
it in his experience. Why should I doubt the 
truth of the claims made in the catalogue of the 
seedsman who is eager to pass on a better celery 
to his customers.^ 

Then I call to mind the keen discrimination of 
that fine old Scotch gardener who had been select- 
ing for years the softest and clearest colors, and the 
longest spurs, on the columbines he was growing 
in a mighty expensive garden near Boston. Why 
shouldn't that strain of columbine be better, as 
offered on the catalogue-pages of the seedsman 
who gave him a market for the results of his skill, 
and whose own prosperity depends on continued 
confidence? 

There comes to mind another of these bits of 
inside knowledge concerning the ways of the seeds- 
man This particular man does not love novelties 



24 MY GROWING GARDEN 



of the foreign sort, but he beheves that rigid and 
thoughtful selection toward a high ideal is sure to 
bring about improvements that are worth while 
in standard sorts of vegetables. So all summer 
he travels to where his seed-crops are growing — 
and they are planted where they grow best to 
uniform excellence — in order that he may cull and 
cut out, or "rogue" in the trade phrase, every 
plant not up to his exacting standard. If he is 
wrong, so was Darwin; but I believe in both. 

When I first began to photograph things that 
grow in the ground, I took what was really a 
beautiful picture of a certain radish to a veteran 
seedsman — a great old man whose years had been 
spent in searching always for the best. He saw 
no beauty in the photograph, because, as he ex- 
plained to me, the tails of the radishes were entirely 
too ""coarse." Think of refined radish tails, Mr. 
Doubter-of -Seedsmen, and realize just how, by 
a lifetime's interest in selecting so that the flesh 
would get into the radish and out of the tails, it 
has come about that you are served at breakfast 
with delicious little globes, or ovals, or thick 
pencils, of fresh pungency. 

Grass is just grass, of course, to most of us; yet 
another of these discriminating seedsmen has been 
considering otherwise for a generation. He knows 



PLANNING AND THE CATALOGUES 25 



each little blade or plant in your lawn separately, 
and when he has dug up a spoonful of your soil, 
he knows why you have or haven't a good lawn, 
and how you can have one. To him, a bag of 
mixed grass seed is a whole dictionary, and he can 
read the hieroglyphics of it. Why should I doubt 
his word as to any grass proposition.^ 

Now most of the flower-seed ^'novelties" come 
from Europe, and those old Germans and French- 
men have been doing such things plus for hundreds 
of years. Of course they make mistakes — nearly 
everyone does except you and I, gentle reader — 
but they try not to; and when an improved plant 
comes over the Atlantic, it has been sent, almost 
invariably, because the master seedsman was sure 
it was better. 

So I'm no doubting Thomas on the "novelties." 
Some of them will not do well with me, because 
the conditions are unfavorable, or because I do 
not know how to guide aright their growth. Yet 
enough will do well to make the experiment worth 
while; and all the while I have the fun and the 
anticipation, which are at least sixty per cent of 
the game. 

Therefore, I knowingly and gladly submit to 
the lure of the catalogues, selecting such standard 
sorts and such novelties as look best to my sanguine 



26 MY GROWING GARDEN 



eyes. That I usually buy and sow two to ten 
times as many kinds and plants as I can at all find 
room for is no sort of fault or harm, for I can give 
away plants even more happily than the nicotinist 
gives away a cigar, and with as much heart- 
warming thankfulness coming my way. I have 
given life, to grow, in good fortune, to continuing 
beauty or tasteliness; while the cigar, already dead, 
has to be cremated to afford a brief pleasure. 

I find that I have been buying each February 
for this growing garden something hke a hundred 
packets of seeds. I always intend to get less; but 
so long as these catalogues are alphabetical, and I 
must go right through from aquilegia to zinnia, 
from asparagus to witloof, I am hkely to fall by 
the wayside, and linger in the varieties of annuals 
and perennials, and peas and corn. What harm? 
I get flowers, vegetables, knowledge, fun ! 

In February just a few things ought to get going, 
after these fine fat Httle packets have been parcel- 
posted to me. I shall hope to realize the early 
bloom of the Margaret carnations this year by 
February sowing. Just how, the garden-book 
reminders and the catalogues will tell me; I'm 
not intending to transcribe here any directions 
that are better had elsewhere. 



CHAPTER III— MARCH 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 

IN this middle-states location, Marcli as a 
spring month is not an entire success. Its 
early days are likely to be as wintry as the 
coldest February, and it is safer to expect a blizzard 
than a zephyr any time. Yet there is something of 
spring to be noted, even when deep frost holds 
the ground from the spade, and while the furnace 
yet yawns for the few remaining shoveKuls of the 
coal supply that was so surely to last the winter 
through. 

Look at the upturning tips of the horse-chestnut 
twigs, and note there a shiny, smooth coating over 
the fat terminal buds that may even be sticky to 
the touch — if you can touch it. If you had looked 
in February, you would have seen just the same 
buds, but not so shiny-sticky, and not quite so 
large. They are preparing for the spring jump. 

The lilac buds also are worth close inspection. 
They, too, are fat and plump, where they are to 
be flowers rather than leaves; and, while they have 
been plump all winter, they are just a bit softer, 

(27) 



28 MY GROWING GARDEN 



looser, and seemingly riper. They are ready as 
well for the impending event — the whole joyous 
resurrection that makes a northern spring some- 
thing so luxuriant, so sweet, that the visitor from 
a supposedly more flowerful clime, like Cahfornia 
or Florida, exclaims in astonishment. 

But it is not yet spring — it is March, in this 
latitude the least genial, the least pleasing, the 
most capricious month of all the year. Usually 
nothing can be done in the ground during the first 
three weeks of this windy twelfth of the calendar, 
save to sometimes look over and stake out the 
garden. Indeed, any time the month and nature 
may combine to tell me that winter is not over and 
gone. One day of a later March than the first at 
Breeze Hill, after a light snowfall, there came a rain 
that froze around every limb and twig, and that 
in particular showed me how exquisitely beautiful 
the Thunberg barberry hedge can become when it 
blooms in crystal. This hedge, by the way, is the 
finest year-round thing on the place, for it is never 
lacking in interest. This frozen sleet has also em- 
phasized the dainty structure of that fine linden 
along the axis walk. 

There is, however, plenty to do, despite the 
snow and sleet, while the ground remains so 
frozen as to bear a wagon. The substance that is 



Plate VI. ''A rain that froze around every twig . . . showed 
how beautiful the Thunberg barberry hedge can become 
w^hen it blooms in crystal." (See page 28.) 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 29 



to help this poor ground, this newly graded shale, 
to produce flowers and fruits and vegetables, can 
now be handily placed on the land. This is an 
excellent time for manure hauling and spreading. 

When I faced the first spring on the barren 
acres of Breeze Hill I did not at all realize the 
problem of fertilization, nor did I even know what 
it meant to put humus in the ground. I bought 
two or three two-horse loads of slightly rotted 
stable manure, and thought I was well started ! 

Now I know that this hungry land, full of 
willingness to work for me, cannot so work unless 
it is fed, and well fed, and then fed some more. 
So I am always on the lookout for manure, to be 
taken any time I can get it, and to be piled for 
rotting if it cannot be at once put on the land. 
One spring the man I hired to do some plowing got 
disgusted and quit because I insisted on having 
him plow deeper than the three or four inches he 
thought sufficient, and because, as he expressed 
it, *'There ain't no sense in plowin' manure out 
when I'm tryin' to plow it in!" He was getting 
into contact with the covering of manure turned 
under in the late fall, and which he thought 
ought to be ample. 

I have heard various stories about putting too 
much manure into the land, but I have never seen 



80 MY GROWING GARDEN 



that land, nor have I yet seen anyone who has 
seen it. As nearly as I can manage it now, I put 
on, and dig in, and plow in and down, all the 
manure I can obtain, about twice a year, with the 
result of beginning to see that the ground is happy 
and productive. It is not too rich, nor nearly 
rich enough, and I think the available manure 
supply and my ability to obtain a reasonable por- 
tion of it will for a long time prevent the calamity 
of over-richness here ! 

At first, as I have said, a little manure went a 
great way, and it did little for the land. I know 
now that I need to trench or dig over to at least a 
foot in depth every inch of land that is to grow 
vegetables, and to supply very nearly two feet of 
fertile facility for flower-borders and beds. About 
all the early six-inch preparation of those first 
years has been gone over by now, adding manure 
lavishly, and removing, or breaking up the hard 
shale substratum. 

And I have used considerable dynamite to 
loosen this heavy shale bottom. It appears that if 
the shale is broken up, and any sort of humus 
admitted, either of manure or of plant roots, the 
strong, basic fertility of the soil is unlocked, so 
that fine growth results. One plot was sub-soiled 
by digging holes about eight feet apart and two 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 31 



feet deep, and in these holes driving down another 
two feet a bar that made room in each for a haK- 
stick of forty per cent dynamite, which when 
exploded shook apart the shale without throwing 
any of it out. There was thus provided room for 
water and root action, and both are needed. 

What I have written as to using manure freely 
must be read as applying to my problem, which is 
by no means what some other garden-growers may 
have to face. I am writing of how fertihty has 
been applied to and unlocked from this rough 
and long-neglected shale soiL I have seen happy 
gardeners working on soil — deep, black, rich — that 
made me envious, until I reahzed how much more 
fun I was having. 

That first spring the smell of the trash fire was 
constantly about Breeze Hill. I sorrow to think 
of the potential fertility I foolishly burned, in 
raked-up leaves and grass, in gathered weeds and 
vegetable refuse. No such wastefulness occurs 
now. Every leaf, every weed, every bit of lawn 
clipping, every scrap of vegetable waste, goes into 
the muck-pile, there to be wet and turned, and 
then again wet and turned, at least six times in a 
year. Any March snow is heaped over this muck- 
pile and, if it is unfrozen, intermixed with it. Last 
spring I had the satisfaction of seeing the year-old 



32 MY GROWING GARDEN 



pile worked through an inch-mesh screen, giving 
me a remainder of soft, rich black earth, the much- 
to-be-desired *^leaf-mold/* which is greatly com- 
mended by gardeners for many things, and which 
is most helpful when mixed into this lumpy shale 
at Breeze Hill. 

I bought some leaf-mold three years ago, in 
which to plant certain rhododendrons from the 
woods. It cost me, delivered on the place, $4.15 
per cubic yard, which puts a value on the product 
of my muck-pile, that product being exactly as 
good as the purchased article. That muck-pile, 
by the way, can rightly be termed, instead, a soil 
factory; for it has taken shape so that at one end 
the lovely, soft ''black dirt" can be screened out, 
while at the other end are accumulating leaves, 
weeds, stems and all forms of soft and not woody 
vegetable waste. 

If any reader of these words takes weariness at 
details of manure and muck, let him thereby know 
that for him a garden will never really grow, in the 
true sense ! It is to me worth while to see nature's 
prodigality in leaf and stem and succulent plant 
body returned to the earth that gave it, enriched 
with the precious nitrogen taken from the air; and 
no less a joy to see animal excrement rot down into 
black humus, the finest of all fertilizers. And to 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 33 



get these substances into the waiting ground in 
late March, ahead of the April rains, is no small 
part of the garden pleasure, because my imagi- 
nation carries along the unseen sight of the chemical 
processes that are going on in the land, conserving 
waste, unlocking fertility, holding moisture in 
ready shape, and increasing the power of the 
earth to serve mankind. All that I am thus doing 
is to follow the more deliberate processes of nature, 
for the dropping leaf, the rotting twigs and trunks, 
the incidental animal excrement, all happen natu- 
rally, even though slowly, if man keeps his hands 
off the face of the land. 

Here in this growing garden the so-called "green 
manuring" has helped me mightily to hasten the 
process of getting the ground into mellow tilth. 
I will write later about choosing weeds; but I may 
here properly say a word about how the growing 
and turning under of the land-improving plants 
has helped. One bit of yellow-red shale grading, 
as unpromising for growth as the side of a rock, 
has in three years been made into quite respectable 
soil by alternating crops of sand vetch and rye 
with coatings of manure and plantings of vegetables. 

These manure-crops are very nice to see, too ! 
The rye, sowed last fall just ahead of a freeze-up, 
has given us a bright green lawn to look at when- 
c 



34 MY GROWING GARDEN 



ever the snow is off. The vetch that now covers 
another patch with a thick mat of its prostrate 
stems is also persistently green, and will bloom in 
purple glory if I do not get it turned under very 
early this spring. It is better than the rye, the soil- 
sharps tell us, because it gathers from the air the 
expensive and essential nitrogen, storing it in 
little nodules along the roots. As the whole plant 
is to be turned under, I get this nitrogen to work, 
and also the humus resulting from the buried 
herbage. I will thus have a thin underlying muck- 
pile to be rotting into usefulness for a year or more 
— for the authorities insist that the full benefit 
from a turned-under green-manure crop is not 
obtained until the second year. 

I must ask pardon for writing of "crops" and 
otherwise as if I were deahng with acres instead of 
little garden patches! Yet the problems are just 
the same, save that my desire, at least, is for more 
intensive culture than is usual in acreage work in 
rich and wasteful America. 

There is another thing to do these March days, 
and by all means the most disagreeable of garden 
operations. It is to begin spraying, with the un- 
pleasantly strong "dope" requisite to permanently 
discourage the big-devil scale, named San Jose, 
and the lesser evil named after the oyster-shell. 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 35 



Like other unpleasant things, one is disposed 
to postpone the doing; but "take it from me," 
that is a mistake! I waited, or delayed, over one 
winter, to spray some beautifully shaped currant- 
bushes that had given us a notable crop; and when 
I did get around to it, the San Jose scale had sucked 
the juices out of most of the stems, so they had 
to be cut off and burned. Nowadays I spray on 
the first fair and still day after I see any signs of 
either scale, and in late February or early March 
everything that is scale-susceptible gets thorough 
and repeated going over "for luck," or for surer 
protection against scales and other evils. 

This latter general spraying protects as well as 
punishes, and it is quite as disagreeable to other 
predaceous bugs and their eggs as it is to the two 
main scale promoters of destruction I have men- 
tioned. 

The commercial lime-sulphur spray, in winter 
or dormant proportions, and preferably with lead 
arsenate added to give it killing potency for any- 
thing that eats, is a jaundiced -looking liquid, 
rather oily in consistence, and most unsuitable to 
get on any clothing ever to be worn again. An 
old rubber coat, rubber gloves, a disregardable 
hat, and much care to keep to windward, are 
essential to the comfort of the operator. 



36 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



Most of all, he needs to be sure to cover every 
least twig of the trees and shrubs with the thinnest 
coating of the spray. At least twice each tree 
needs to be hit with the finest possible mist, high 
and low, right and left, and from all sides. To see 
to it that the nozzle of the spray tool is clean and 
clear, and to filter every drop that goes into the 
tank through a sieve good enough for the gasolene 
that is to run your automobile, will make for good 
work in the shortest time with the least waste. 

As to what spray machine to use, I don't know ! 
I have some seventy-five-cent hand syringes, an 
acceptable shoulder-tank affair, and a barrel-pump 
machine mounted on wheels. Any one of them 
works when it works, and is abominable when it 
doesn't. The thing to be accomplished, as I have 
said, is to get every twig thinly but completely 
covered with the spray fluid. Drops hanging down 
are no indication of anything but much fluid; the 
upper surface of the limb from which the drop 
hangs may be entirely free from needed spray- 
coating. It is desirable to get the highest pressure 
of air possible against the liquid to be sprayed, 
so that a wide-spreading fine mist issues from the 
nozzle. Pervasiveness, and not quantity, is what 
counts and kills. 

Persistence, care, observation — all these I have 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 37 



tried to use, but I can be humiliated any day by 
some spray-sharp who leads me out to the garden, 
as one did the other day, to show me a thick coating 
of oyster-shell scale along the limbs of two fine 
cornuses — ^the red-twigged and the yellow-twigged 
varieties. 

But I'll keep spraying; I'll spray without ceas- 
ing ! I can't afford to have any part of my growing 
garden made a dying garden by these nasty little 
pests. Later I'll have to spray the fruit trees in 
bloom for protection against the codlin moth and 
other predatory bugs, and later again the young 
fruits on the grapes and apricots and plums for 
curculio and brown rot and various similar devil- 
ments. 

On certain March days that have sunned the 
soil so it can be moved, I want to make sure that 
my apple, peach, plum and apricot trees, and my 
cherished red-buds, are free from the hateful 
borers that like to chew into the young tree trunks 
right at and under the ground. They have termi- 
nated the existence of several of the trained dwarf 
apple trees I was coddling for early fruiting, and 
every such tree on the place has had a visitation. 
The only remedy is to dig them out with a knife- 
blade and a wire-puncher, and keep after them so 
often that they simply can't get along in peace. 



38 MY GROWING GARDEN 



I have smeared on concentrated lime-sulphur solu- 
tion, which they seem to revel in ! Smashing them 
with a knife or wire is the only sure thing. 

Part of the garden plan for Breeze Hill is that 
looking from any part of the house there shall be 
an agreeable view of things growing, and that 
looking toward the house from any part of the 
garden there shall also be a pleasant prospect of 
plants or shrubs or trees. That is, I am to imitate 
the wisdom of the Frenchmen who have made 
Paris beautiful, and to consider vistas in every 
direction. Anyone who has visited the French 
capital will of course have noted that not even a 
letter-box or a lamp-post is planted anywhere 
without consideration of its relation to the street 
as a whole, which is why the French get so much 
beauty for little cost. 

Now I ought to be able and willing to do as 
well with plants that grow in grace as the shrewd 
Gaul does with stiffly permanent architectural 
objects. Therefore a series of pictures is to be 
created, and I need to have those pictures relate 
in color and season to their surroundings. There 
can be few or no straight "rows" of anything, and 
anyhow I have plenty of straight lines in the bases 
of axial walks and ancient hedges which I must 
work from and toward. 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 39 



These early March days, consequently, I have 
been thinking out planting vistas, so that to the 
nurserymen may go the Usts of needed shrubs and 
trees. 

I have found that it is easy enough to have the 
spring and early summer burst of bloom, but not 
so easy to see to it that some flowers are in sight 
throughout the summer and the fall. 

The colors on the planting-palette are in several 
height-forms also. There are yellows in taller 
shrubs and in dwarf er spring-blooming bulbs; 
there are shadings of pink in herbaceous plants, in 
shrubs of varied form; and there is always white 
for merging and combining, in bulb and plant and 
shrub. Blue comes less easily, and must be placed 
where it will fit; some dashes of scarlet are the 
exclamation points. 

Then, too, there is form to consider. The 
graceful deutzia is to be a fountain of white, while 
the hollyhocks in the same vista are like blunted 
spires, pointing upward in lemon or crimson or 
pink. It is this need for consideration of the effect 
that is most trouble and that brings the most 
results. I began without the picture idea, and I 
hid one shrub behind another, mixed colors regard- 
lessly, planted according to the size of the nursery 
plant or the root rather than the eventual spread, 



40 MY GROWING GARDEN 



and did the other things that wasted time and 
effort — but gave me humiHty! 

Now I am working more intelligently, and 
making fewer mistakes. The mistakes were for my 
good; for they made me think out the problems 
for myseK, as I could not have done had I been 
holding to a plan made wholly by someone else. 
True, I have had and have held to Mr. Manning's 
admirable general plan; but he has only sketched 
the essential outlines, leaving me to fill in the form 
and color and personality. Just so I could wish 
any other maker of a growing garden might do. 

I have in an earlier chapter confessed the lure 
of the catalogue as it applies to seeds. That brown 
pin-point of a seed is so little, so apparently 
trifling, that it seems each time a greater marvel 
that any thing should come from it. Yet come it 
does; and the sheer sport of expecting and of 
waiting makes the seed-adventure the more pleas- 
antly alluring. 

The shrubby plant and the tree are, somehow, 
quite different in catalogue appeal. One seems to 
know more completely what is to happen with 
them. Then, too, there is quite a price-difference 
between ten cents a packet of hundreds of seeds, and 
fifty cents or more for one little plant. Thus it is 
easier to keep close to shore on the plant orders. 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 41 



There is a bothersome deficiency about these 
plant catalogues, I find. They say so much and 
so little; so much about how fine a thing this 
Spirwa Van Houttei is, and so little about how 
much space it will probably cover in the first five 
years and in another similar period. I have had 
to dig out some abelias innocently planted only 
three feet from a buddleia which in one year 
completely overshadowed them. "Why didn't 
the catalogue tell me that the funkias would 
cover quickly a circle of three feet diameter, while 
the dictamnus set near it was easily able to stand 
on a square foot of ground? No one guarded me 
against the error of crowding peonies too closely 
together, or told me that the lovely old bleeding- 
heart would take much room until August, and 
then simply "get off the earth." 

No catalogue I have seen discusses fully these 
important points; and when one is actually issued 
that shows forth such knowledge, I predict great 
demand for it, and I hope for the stock it offers. 

In deciding on the shrubs for the vistas, I have 
tried to look for autumn and winter color, of fading 
leaf and enduring twig, as well as for seasoned 
bloom. Few shrubs bloom more than a month, and 
the most hardly half so long; but the leaves are 
often a full month in changing color before they 



42 MY GROWING GARDEN 



drop, and the twigs and branches are in bare 
view for most of six months. It is therefore most 
desirable to know how the subject in mind will 
work into the fall and winter picture, as well as 
what its budding, leafing and blooming earher 
v/ill be like. 

I have been enjoying, these leafless days, the 
warm yellow-gray tone of a young hlac that held 
its foHage in sohd green right through the early 
frosts until December's sudden zero dropped them^ 
and I recognize a new merit in this pleasant twig 
color. Some time the catalogues that oflFer me 
nature-paints in plants with which to work out 
year-round pictures will get to telling all about 
their pigments, so that I may use them with 
more assurance in an endeavor to get varieties 
that have more than temporary attractiveness. 
The reading of the bulletins of the wonderful 
Arnold Arboretum, at Jamaica Plain, Massachu- 
setts, has shown me how that world-master of 
trees and shrubs. Professor Sargent, is continually 
telhng us unacute Americans of the real values of 
ornamental plants at all seasons. Who would buy 
furniture for his home that would be pleasant to 
see only two or three months in the year? And 
why should we furnish our gardens so wholly with 
the plants that explode into one bloom burst, with 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 43 



little to commend them for all the rest of the year, 
when we might as well have the bloom plus good 
autumn color and attractive winter twigs? 

When it comes to buying these needed shrubs 
that must get into the ground as soon as it is 
workable, I am after quaUty rather than lowest 
price. There is frequently a difiFerence of fifty per 
cent in price between the offerings made by several 
nurserymen for the same item. The lowest-priced 
is not often the cheapest. One bushy, well-rooted 
spirea, for instance, full of vigor and showing trans- 
planting and good soil help, and dug so that it 
comes to me with all its roots, is worth four or 
five spindly, leggy plants just as high, but plainly 
disclosing their poor origin and maintenance, and 
not infrequently delivered to the planter with both 
scanty and mutilated roots. 

I made the mistake of buying in one order the 
larger-sized shrubs, rather than those a year 
younger and of medium but stocky size. They 
were bigger when they came, to be sure, but they 
indicated plainly their need of severe pruning, 
which when given set them back more than a 
year. Now I ask for young and vigorous plants, 
which are more likely to come with roots but little 
mutilated, and I see the better results in growth, 
besides saving the considerable difference in cost. 



44 MY GROWING GARDEN 



To be sure, there are a few nurserymen who keep 
transplanting and root-pruning all the time, and 
who can in consequence ship large shrubs, with a 
"ball" of earth burlaped about the roots. But 
these fine things are hardly "my size," for I must 
make each garden dollar count to the utmost. 

March is passing while these experiences are 
being told. About the opening day of the almanac 
or oflScial spring, on the twenty-first, it is allowable 
to look for evidences of the sun's power. Under the 
old arborvitse hedge, and along its southern border, 
I am accustomed to find some white sweet violets 
that are there happily naturalized. Their fra- 
grance is as delightful as it is significant of things 
doing in the bosom of Mother Earth. The crocuses 
are likely to pop open suddenly some one of these 
mornings, nor will a snow flurry or a sharp frost 
discompose them in the least. Of course the snow- 
drops are up and doing; they seem to prefer to 
invite comparison between their whiteness and 
that of the frozen water that gives them name. In 
sunny facings, the Golden Spur narcissus buds 
show richly yellow, and they promise an early 
April glow. The pussy-willow buds are well along, 
as the first of the bees soon discover, and those fat 
lilac buds are almost bursting. There are signs 
and scents and sights of spring all about the 




Plate VII. 



'March is passing . . . The crocuses are hkely to 
pop open suddenly." (See page 44.) 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 45 



garden, even though in northern corners some time- 
worn snow yet Ungers. Where I hft the loose pro- 
tection from the bulb beds, I see there fat yellowish 
green shoots, hunting the hght; but I drop back 
the Ktter, and say, ''Not yet; Jack Frost is looking 
for you !" 

The soil, too, in this last week of the month is 
usually fit to push a spade into. To plant roses, 
trees, shrubs, now, means a greater assurance of 
prosperity for them. This is true especially of 
"dormant" or outdoor-grown roses, much the best 
kind to plant. All the better if the ground was 
made ready before frost closed it in the early winter; 
but whenever it is workable in March, the holes 
may be made, and the soil stirred up with rotten 
manure, to be fully prepared for planting promptly 
when the shrubs are at hand. 

It has been a sort of fetish with us to plant 
early peas in March, if possible, just as my Pennsyl- 
vania German ancestors beheved that St. Patrick's 
day — March seventeenth — was the one time for 
sowing late cabbage seed, even if it had to be sowed 
on the snow! Neither habit seems sensible; for we 
assuredly take better care of our cabbage-sowings 
now in a coldframe, and I have found that Gradus 
peas sown the last days of March, in soil that had 
not felt the warming touch of the sun to any depth, 



46 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



hardly keep pace with those put into more cheerful 
ground some days later. It is the same with sweet 
peas; they love cool ground, I know, but they dis- 
criminate against chilly ground, often soaked with 
snow water. 

No vital harm has happened, in my garden, if 
March has passed without a single seed being sown 
in the open. My acute friend Kirby, a real seeds- 
man, is threatening to put forth a table of soil 
temperatures, so that we may know just what is 
the right Fahrenheit degree at six inches depth to 
spell quick germination for the peas and spinach 
and other desirable "garden sass" items. I think 
such knowledge would be most valuable to have 
and desirable to work with. 

I remembered how as a boy I saw rhubarb 
hurried up in early spring by covering the plants 
with barrels. Two years ago I did it here, and with 
the same success; but by accident the third March 
one barrel was used that was completely tight — it 
was a sugar barrel, I think. And there had been 
heaped about it some rather hot horse-manure, this 
as usual. The result was that under the tight barrel, 
admitting no least ray of light, there sprang up 
the most beautiful, tender and altogether delicious 
leaf -stalks of rhubarb. The leaves under the barrels 
that admitted some light and air were good, but 



GETTING INTO THE GROUND 47 



not of the superlative excellence of those growing 
in the warm darkness. Therefore I shall every 
March hereafter see to it that similar conditions 
are provided for some of my rhubarb plants. 

During the latter half of March the hotbeds and 
coldframes have been made useful to start things 
for the early outdoor garden, and to push ahead 
the long-season flower items particularly. Asters, 
cosmos, salvia, petunia and many other seeds are 
in or germinating or up. To have a long season 
with tomatoes, plants sown in late February are 
now transplanted to pots, and they will be kept 
going right along. There are really earlier sorts 
for these advance plantings — Field's Early June 
is one that made good almost in June with us. 

It was rather hard to get my business mind to 
take up garden problems in the earlier years of this 
growing garden, but now the family jogs me if I 
shp, and my son is ready to do the actual early 
work with that particularity which means success. 
We are determined to eat from Breeze Hill garden 
as early and as late as prevision can arrange, and 
so there is thought to plan the succession for a 
long season of better things than any money can 
bring. For eye pleasing, we want flowers early — 
they are with us already, as I have noted, while 
snow yet remains — and we want them in sight 



48 MY GROWING GARDEN 



every day until long after the first frost stops the 
tender things. Such is the garden programme, 
modified by the absence of a trained gardener and 
his appurtenant greenhouses. We are the garden- 
ers, and our frames, cold and **hot," must do the 
early pushing. We face the planting months with 
much anticipation and each year with growing 
confidence. 



CHAPTER IV— APRIL 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS, AND SOME RESULTS 

PLANT; plant early, plant carefully; but 
plant! Such is the impulse of April; and 
the planting must be of seeds for food and 
for flower, of trees for fruit and for foliage, and of 
shrubs and plants for all these ends. Plant early; 
that is the vital point for most things, as my five 
interesting years of Breeze Hill garden experience 
sums it up. 

For it seems in some way to definitely promote 
the prosperity and progress of the plants if this 
chilly April ground settles early about their roots, 
even if a later snow or two suggests a return to 
winter. The reason probably is that, with the 
plant or tree thus in place, the root action may 
begin without any waste of time at just the moment 
enough of the sim's warmth is available; while 
later planting, in too many cases, means that 
healthy root action has been begun in the wrong 
place — at the nursery, in the package, or where 
temporarily ''heeled in" awaiting weather, ground 
preparation, or convenience. 

D (49) 



50 MY GROWING GARDEN 



One season I bought dormant roses from a 
nursery north of me, which came and were planted 
before April fifteenth. They were so sturdy and 
stocky and good-looking that I ordered "more of 
the same;" but the second shipment, caught in that 
big nursery's spring rush, was delayed until early 
May, so that the second lot of roses were not 
planted until May fifteenth. Most of the plants 
were yet "dormant," or unstarted; but though the 
planting was careful, the ground warm, the rains 
encouraging, more than a third of them either 
failed to grow at all, or died after making a weak 
start. All of the earlier lot grew without check, 
and bloomed beautifully the first season. 

I have had other similar experiences, and I have 
suggested to some of my rose-growing friends that 
it would be showing good business courage if 
there were plain refusal, on the part of the nursery- 
man, to ship roses after a certain critical date 
for each climate range. Failures would be fewer, 
and consequently planting would be more liberally 
undertaken; for nothing so discourages the average 
garden-maker as having plants die for him when 
he has done his best. 

For me, dormant roses must be planted in 
March if they are available and if the ground can 
be worked, but certainly before April twentieth. 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 51 



And I don't at all care for the "started" roses in 
pots; they may doubtless do beautifully in many 
places, but have so far done most unbeautifuUy 
in my garden. Can I be blamed for following the 
indications of my own experience? 

Other trees and shrubs are less sensitive to the 
calendar, I think; but any hardy, dormant, growing 
thing is given a better chance for prosperity if it is 
planted early. The nurserymen are willing and 
glad to get the "stock" off to the planter as soon 
as the ground is open to them. Some of them 
carry certain trees and plants over winter in great 
sheds, where they are unfrozen; and if the stock in 
these sheds is "heeled in" so that the roots are 
covered with damp soil, the plants may be con- 
sidered good. Where the storage is in bins, with 
exposed roots, I have come to believe that the 
vitality of the trees and plants is materially 
lessened over winter; wherefore I should prefer 
for myself freshly dug stock, even if it had to come 
a Kttle later. 

If I do not here set down my belief that one can 
with success plant anything at any time, ij he 
takes trouble enough^ I shall be blamed with incon- 
sistency later. Such is my belief, based on some 
experience; but I call particular attention to the 
italics. The "trouble enough" is trouble enough. 



52 MY GROWING GARDEN 



or there will be trouble if it is not enough; where- 
fore the path of ease and certainty hes along the 
planting ways of proper times. 

Several of the seven old horse-chestnuts that 
too closely embowered the mansion-house at 
Breeze Hill were considerably decayed, I found that 
first spring. Two of them were cut out entirely, 
admitting sunlight to the home, and giving room 
for the remaining five to fill out more comfortably. 
To these five the attention of my old friend John 
Davey was asked; and he found them badly split, 
and that their trunks were partly rotten. Later his 
men came and practised ^'tree surgery" upon these 
same trunks, and with the most favorable results. 
In one trunk, split at its forking a dozen feet from 
the ground, a nut from the tree had germinated, 
and had so grown in the rotting wood of its own 
parent tree as to have more than two feet in length 
of bushy roots! This tree was the "sickest" of 
all; but cleaning out the infection, putting in strong 
iron bones in place of its decayed wooden heart, 
filling with cement, bracing with chains, started it 
to growing most vigorously and happily. It has 
not failed any spring to be covered with its lovely 
blooms, and the young growth is "rolling" over 
the opening in the trunk as if it intended to make 
a complete covering. 



Plate VIII. "Tree surgery . . . lliis tree was I he 'sickest' . 
now growing most vigorously and happily." (See page 52.) 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 53 



At first blush, the average cost of about $30 
for each tree, which was the surgical expense, 
seemed large. When I considered that it would 
take all of thirty favoring years of new growing to 
give me as good a tree as the tree doctor provided 
from the old wreck in two weeks of intelligent 
repair work, I had to conclude that the job was 
cheap enough. Looking fairly at one hundred and 
fifty dollars "saved" and the five trees gone — and 
they were going fast! — the money made a mighty 
small pile, and it cast no shade from the summer's 
sun, as the trees did, and continue to do. It is 
"me for the tree-doctor" now, because I have no 
certainty that I can wait on earth for young trees 
to replace the old and picturesque ones that make 
this growing garden fit to live in. 

Just the same way I have felt about the giant 
sycamore which dominates the whole place. An 
ill-intentioned "anthracnose," as Professor Whetzel 
calls it, had been pushing off the young leaves in 
the spring soon after they spread their soft greenery 
to the sun, and thus forcing the tree to make a 
second crop of leaves each season, much to its 
quite apparent distress. Without assuring me of 
its eflicacy, the professor advised spraying with 
bordeaux mixture to discourage the anthracnose. 
Now spraying my orchard of dwarf trees not over 



54 MY GROWING GARDEN 



six feet high is one thing, but quite another is 
spraying the primeval monarch, up toward a 
hundred feet in the air, ten feet about at breast 
height, and with a spread over the lawn of seventy- 
five feet! It could be done, however, and it has 
been done, three times, to the tree's apparent 
benefit. Any reasonable thing is worth while to 
keep ahve and happy a big or a fine or an eye- 
filling tree, as I see it. 

The dwarf fruit-garden, or orchard, was planted 
at Breeze Hill during this month of rains. I 
thought I had not space enough for "standard" 
trees, and I have shared the common behef that 
many years would pass before they would bear. 
The dwarfs, planted closer and fruiting sooner, 
seemed indicated, and they were put in place the 
next April after our June first occupancy of this 
garden-home. They have prospered mightily and 
fruited scantily, save as to the plums and peaches 
and the trashy Bismarck apple. If it were all to 
do over again, I think I would plant standard trees, 
rather than dwarfs; but the first full fruiting year 
may change this feeling. Certainly the dwarf* 
orchard is good to look upon. 

The apple and pear trees were trained speci- 
mens from Germany. In addition, I planted some 
thirty-six feet of an "espaher" just south of the 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 55 



old arborvitse hedge, because it seemed an ideal 
place for training some pears and apples upon the 
framework known by the French name given 
above. The twelve trees for this alBFair had been 
"personally conducted" for the purpose from their 
tender youth, I presume, and a really delightful 
German gardener attached to a nearby nursery 
has trained me to train them up as they should 
go — which is great fun. 

I have had no illusions about this espalier 
planting. I knew it was not necessary in this 
fruit-favorable cHmate to tie up each stem and 
twig to face the sun; but I have wanted to see 
what would come of it. I'm seeing, and I'm not 
dissatisfied. The first fruits came last year on 
two trees, and they were good; but they were even 
prettier than they were good. And, too, it gives 
me such a fine chance to swell up a little when I 
lead visitors to this nook, to disclose to their 
surprised gaze these elaborately flattened out little 
trees ! 

The small-fruit part of this garden has been 
quite satisfactory. The currants have done ex- 
ceedingly well, except as interrupted by San Jose 
scale when I was not vigilant. The blackberries 
and red raspberries, both trained on wires, have 
likewise done their full duty by us. 



56 MY GROWING GARDEN 



The neighborhood of this old garden was famous 
for its strawberries, as I shall detail later, and I 
have maintained that fame in my later plantings, 
I think. The last April planting was of one hun- 
dred "Progressive," a fall-bearing sort, which — 
but there ! I'm getting ahead of my story. 

The resolve to make this garden give us good 
things to eat imphes attention to vegetable seed- 
sowing early and often in April. The very first 
day of the month saw a sowing of "Gradus" peas, 
and on the fourteenth, last year, we tried an exper- 
iment proposed in a garden journal by a seed-sharp 
whose ambition somewhat outruns his knowledge. 
Eight separate sorts of peas were sowed the same 
day, the promise being that they would mature in 
such succession as to give us six weeks of a vege- 
table that we are fond of. They didn't happen 
exactly that way, but somewhat so, as will later 
appear. 

Radishes, of course, come along in April — ^the 
nice little French breakfast sorts in about three 
weeks after sowing, if the ground is rich and fine. 
I didn't know last year how good spinach was, 
until autumn; but this year it is going to come 
along with the peas, in two weeks' successions, 
with the New Zealand variety as the summer 
standby. 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 57 



Sweet peas are to be sown early, and we try to 
get them in about with the first "eat" peas, though 
I am not at all sure that it is an advantage to do 
so. They deserve a little warmth in the soil, as 
well as soil of extra depth — we work it and enrich 
it full two feet, for results. No longer am I inclined 
to have so many sorts — a half-dozen is probably 
too many, though the descriptions of new sorts 
each season are most seductive ! 

When I read the English literature about sweet 
peas, I am almost afraid to sow any here. Who are 
we recent Pennsylvanians, merely three or four 
generations from the woods, to compete with soil 
three feet deep, edged by lawns a thousand years 
old! This climate, too, passing rapidly from frost 
to near-boiling, is unkind to plants that love moist, 
cool soil, and sunny cool days. Yet such as they 
come to be, sweet peas in America are "not so 
worse," and I'll keep along, always working toward 
better care, plenty of husky fertilizer, and water, 
water, water! The plants will not stay green to 
the very ground, and we will fail to pick every 
bloom before it spends itself in a seed-pod; but 
we'll have at least some of the pleasure our British 
friends gloat over. It seems practicable to go 
down into the earth the best part of a yard with 
the sweet pea trench, and to start with six inches 



58 MY GROWING GARDEN 



of rough manure to hold moisture, following with 
layers of soil and manure to the top. 

I wonder what is the best training procedure for 
peas of all sorts? In this garden we've fussed with 
many sorts of equivalents for the "brush" that 
would probably be ideal until we had it. For peas 
to eat, we've used "chicken wire," even up to 
four and five feet; but it's a sort of expensive nui- 
sance. For sweet peas, the chicken wire, and also 
a scheme of strips my ingenious son worked out, 
which seemed to meet all needs when planned, and 
nearly none when used. Six-foot cypress stakes, 
driven in a foot, and "strung" between with 
coarse twine, worked once; but it was slow business 
to put the trellis up, and heavy rains set it to 
twisting around too much. There are costly 
trellises in the catalogues, or in the seed-stores; 
but I can't take so much of my slim garden appro- 
priation for things that won't grow. 

One year I had planted some sweet peas in late 
fall, to secure an earlier start. I presume the start 
was so early it got clear away, for only four plants 
did actually come through. They grew vocifer- 
ously, and with, in consequence of much mortality 
amongst their neighbors, plenty of room. So I 
provided them — ^the fearless four — with a little 
efifect of sticks and strings on which they produced 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 59 



many and large flowers. This gave me the knowl- 
edge that much room — a haK-foot or more — would 
probably mean more prosperity for the sweet 
peas, wherefore the opening year is to see a similar 
provision for fewer sorts and many less plants 
than usual. But the trelUs.^ 

One sort of trellis I do know about: the trellis 
for the espalier, for grape-vines, for blackberry 
and raspberry canes. What I know is that the 
ordinary "galvanized wire" offered as weather- 
proof, and which I dutifully strung on the heavy 
pipe posts of the espalier and on the durable locust 
posts set for the grape-vines and the "bush" fruits 
or brambles, has simply evaporated into nasty 
brown rust within five years. It was not honest 
iron wire, really "galvanized" with zinc, but 
bessemer steel wire, merely breathed upon with 
the white vapor of hot spelter. Bessemer steel is 
a great structural material, I understand, with 
tensile strength and other qualities plus; but 
exposed to the air it invites oxygen to put it back 
into the earth that gave it, and that speedily ! 

I complained volubly to the hardware man who 
sold me this bunch of rust, and he admitted the 
worthlessness of the wire, adding that there was 
no really reliable wire obtainable. Then he pro- 
posed aluminum, which I bought and applied. 



60 MY GROWING GARDEN 



obtaining for the grape-vines a fine trellis, evi- 
dently durable enough, but too evidently more 
than reasonably expensive, for the wire cost one 
cent per foot. 

There was on the place a tangled mass of the 
wire that had been removed from the grape trel- 
lises of a generation gone, and this was entirely 
intact, so far as rust was concerned. From that 
bundle I used many pieces for varied purposes. 
Later, seeing certain advertising of pure iron, I 
pursued a correspondence which has put into my 
tool-house now, for use this year, a coil of '^Armco" 
iron wire, claimed to be really serviceable. 

In addition to being a good time for planting, 
April is a proper month for much garden work in 
the way of clearing the grounds. The lawn needs 
raking, seed and fertilizer sowing and rolling; and 
earliness counts in lawn-repairing and in lawn- 
making just as it does in rose-planting. The 
grasses seem to be full of willingness to work in 
cool ground, and I have seen some curious happen- 
ings out of the same seed-bag sown from three 
weeks apart, as between an almost solid stand of 
dandy little grass plants in the one early case, and 
a nearly as solid stand of pesky weeds in the sad 
later case. I know it is very much worth while to 
mend lawns and to make lawns just as early as 



Plate IX. ''Ajml is a dal'lodil nioiiih . . . The driveway crescent 
border glows now in Emperor." (See page 66.) 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 61 



possible. Indeed, there have been good results 
here in this garden with seeding so late in the fall 
that the germination did not take place until 
spring, when it happened happily and completely, 
to the destruction of weed seeds and weed prospects. 
■ My preference for native trees and shrubs has 
been expressed. It seems to me very much worth 
while, in addition, to see and study shrubs from 
other chmes which may become valuable here. 
There is a pleasurable feeling, a fascination, in 
experimenting with possibilities, so long as the 
main features of the planting are safely American. 
To work with ''novelties" in plants is little less a 
lottery than to sow the seeds that are to produce 
something better than the best, even if the best 
does not always happen. The Arnold Arboretum 
— the most permanently organized educational 
museum in all the world, about which I wish I 
might write a book! — is looking out to bring to 
America, to try, and to provide growers with, the 
trees and shrubs found in lands afar oflF. For it 
my friend Wilson, a prince of plantsmen, has 
spent years in going over the western part of 
China, that region having been selected because 
of its greater climatic variations, the rigor of its 
winters, and because of a singular geologic simi- 
larity which seems to give the places six weeks 



62 MY GROWING GARDEN 



travel west from Pekin a curious relation to 
eastern North America. In sending Mr. Wilson 
to the very borders of Thibet, Professor Sargent 
was acting upon his own estimation of the im- 
touched plant possibilities of that region. 

The result has more than justified the expec- 
tations. Thousands of new but similar trees and 
plants have been obtained, often at great risk, 
and amid thrilling conditions. These plants are 
growing at the Arboretum, and from them Mr. 
Wilson has selected about a hundred for me to 
try out here at Breeze Hill. It was on an April 
day several years ago that I unpacked the box 
of mysteries and planted the Arboretum shrub- 
bed. To watch these plants start and grow, to 
note their differences and their habits, is to me 
of the greatest interest. Knowing nothing at all 
of their habits, I have had to plant at haphazard, 
and that has added to the interest. Beside a 
standard lonicera — a bush honeysuckle — was set 
another lonicera. How did I know that the first 
named was an "up-and-coming" sort that would 
make a great mass in two growing seasons, while 
its seeming brother of the same family was a 
hug-the-ground trailer that was quickly covered 
out of sight, because too near.^^ Here was a syringa, 
and that I knew to be of lilac relationship; but 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 63 



its dainty cut foliage, '^pinnatifid" in scientific 
accuracy, seemed to belie the name until an even 
daintier flower came to herald what may happen 
this year. There have been many surprises, so 
far, and others are coming, I know. The subjects 
that have bloomed are different, beautiful, and 
worth while; and that is just what Professor 
Sargent has been aiming for, as the tree and 
plant benefactor he is. 

The Arboretum bed has been rather consider- 
ably changed, last fall and this spring, to give 
room to the more vigorous plants, and to put 
certain shrubs where they will obviously be better 
placed. That is part of the fun of it. 

Three years after the dwarf orchard was 
planted there were several vacancies to fill, caused 
by the assiduous work of the borers. I concluded 
to fill them, and to add as well several varieties 
of "old-home" pears, planting standard rather 
than dwarf trees. One Bismarck apple that had 
passed on gave room for another old-home sort, 
the Smokehouse. I'm working out a theory in 
the planting of this apple tree. From a nursery 
that grows apple trees by the milhon I had sent 
me a selected one-year-old Smokehouse — ^that is, 
one year from the bud, one season's growth of the 
Smokehouse scion, but two years of root age. This 



64 MY GROWING GARDEN 



I trimmed to a *'whip," meaning a straight stem 
without branches, and its fine roots I also shortened 
just a httle. 

A hole two feet deep was dug, and at its bottom 
a crowbar was driven down another two feet. 
Into this four-foot depth was slipped a stick of 
forty per cent dynamite. After the thorough 
"tamping-in" that followed, the dynamite was 
exploded, shaking up the subsoil quite thoroughly 
without bringing much of it to the surface. In the 
re-shaped hole, with much good soil, bone dust 
and manure packed well away from its present 
roots, the Smokehouse was planted. It grew 
vigorously last season, and will, I hope, accomplish 
its destined work of beginning to bear in about 
five years, aided by heavy summer pruning. Four 
fine pear trees were similarly planted, and have 
responded pleasingly. 

Toward the end of April the sun usually has 
started things into the joy of spring in this garden. 
The grass, of course, is delightfully green quite 
early in the month, and the flowers that consider 
early snows only an impertinence of waning winter 
are blooming before the fifteenth. Crocuses carry- 
ing over from March have made the south-facing 
border gay; the deepened sky-blue of the scilla 
has excited us along the walk from the house; and 




At the foot there blooms a crescent of Golden Spur 
narcissus." (See page 65.) 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 65 



"Lovers' Lane" is richly showing forth its woods 
gems. Hepatica, bloodroot, rue anemone and 
tooth-wort precede the triUiums which are in full 
show by the last week of the month. In the 
formal garden, the English sweet violet, one of 
my "weeds," about which I will write later, is 
opening its flowers, some of which were showing 
in late March. 

The apricot and the Japanese plums are a 
wonderful show in mid-April, with their complete 
cloud of white blossoms. By the time they are 
falling — and making me hustle to spray them — 
the Norway maples are showing their orchid-like 
flowers, seen of few, I fear; for their yellow- 
green clusters overhead, both lovely and sweet, 
are accepted by the thoughtless as the breaking 
leaves. There is a threat of opening in the opulent 
apple buds, which are pink-streaked now, but 
will need May days to spread them. 

Of the shrubs the forsythia is the only one here 
to bloom fully in April. Its yellow bells are 
shaking in the rainy breezes for ten days or so, 
though the blooms at Breeze Hill have been 
scantier since a fierce winter that evidently 
chilled them below the power to live. At the foot 
of one fine plant which is the April color point of 
the most important living picture from the south 

E 



66 MY GROWING GARDEN 



side of the house there now blooms a crescent of 
Golden Spur narcissus, the hues of which fit ideally 
with the forsythia's clear lemon bells. 

The lilacs show the sun's power in bursting 
buds and each morning I look to see how near are 
the first sweet blooms. With the Arboretum lilac 
surprises to come, I suspect the bloom season will 
be a long one. 

A rather overlooked shrub, Spircea arguta (it has 
no "common" name, I believe), sometimes wakes 
up at the end of April. It is sure to bloom showily 
very early in May, and why more folks haven't 
found out what a lovely white bloom-fountain it 
is, I do not know. It can properly be considered 
as opening the spring season of shrubby spireas, 
to be followed by the well-known Van Houttei, 
and then — at fortunate Breeze Hill — by one of 
Wilson's fine Chinese discoveries, Spircea Henryi, 
with its abundant creamy white blooms. 

April is a daffodil month in this garden. Begin- 
ning with Golden Spur, there follow Emperor and 
Empress, the charming jonquil and the double 
Von Sion. Other and finer sorts are to bloom 
this year, and I am hopeful of getting fully settled 
in my own knowledge the definite classes of this 
charming family, of which most garden-lovers 
know all too little. The sorts that give a range of 



PLANTING OF ALL SORTS 67 



form and color and season are not at all necessarily 
expensive, as I found when I saw them in Mr. 
Hunt's great trial-garden last season. I have 
planted to naturalize the bulbs in several favor- 
able places where they can fight the grass at their 
pleasure, and appear incidentally in it in later 
years. It is evident that the narcissi are to be 
pleasing features of this growing garden, unless all 
signs fail. The driveway crescent border glows 
now in Emperor, with here and there the dainty 
Rugulosus. This crescent must always glow, if I 
can so manage. 

If there is anything more worth getting wet in 
than a warm April rain, I do not know about it. 
It is quite comfortable, thank you, to the normal 
outdoor human, and it is seemingly exciting to 
most plant growth. I have been standing under 
the big Norway maple at the west end of the 
formal garden, seeing things happen, and inhaling 
the intensified sweetness that this sort of shower 
brings out. The maple blooms overhead literally 
drip fragrance, and wherever in the borders the 
dainty arabis is planted, there is a spot of white, 
faintly odorous. The yellow perennial alyssum 
is like a spot of sunshine in the rain, while the 
bells of the convallaria — a name so much easier 
to say than lily-of -the- valley ! — have each a crystal 



68 MY GROWING GARDEN 



hanging from them. My pet weed, the columbine 
— and I will explain this later — is just making its 
bow, and the rain causes interesting action in such 
of its flowers as are opening. 

Planting there has been, all April; but there 
are also some results, and the garden is very much 
alive as May days impend. The table has had its 
first asparagus, and the forced rhubarb-stalks, 
forced as I have previously noted, in total darkness, 
are delicious. There is for the eye and for the 
nostrils a feast now spread, and the palate has its 
pleasures as well. All is right with the season and 
the growing garden. 



Plate XII. "The loveliness of the horse-chestnut's foot-long 
panicle." (See page 72.) 



CHAPTER V— MAY 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 

IF I could readjust the calendar, May would 
have at least fifty days, without abstracting 
any of them from the April that makes May 
possible or from the June into which it matures. 
Many outdoor folks would agree with me that 
we could spare enough days out of February and 
early March to stretch May several weeks. 

It is not the work to do and the beauty of the 
garden to see that is the main motive for this 
greedy desire. Before I had a growing garden of 
my own, I spent much of May in God's greater 
garden, seeing the happenings of that annual 
resurrection that ought to put faith into anyone. 
Now that there is much to keep me at Breeze 
Hill, I am not so free for the woods; yet they call 
me more than ever. 

I want to see the great fiddle-heads of the 
cinnamon ferns do again what I have often seen 
them do. I long for the hillside dotted with red- 
bud and dogwood. The wild phlox, the mertensia, 
the "Dutchman's breeches," the May apple, — how 

(69) 



70 MY GROWING GARDEN 



can I stay away from their annual reception, to 
which I have long had a standing invitation? Who 
is to give to the sermons of Jack-in-the-pulpit the 
cheerful attention he expects of me? That spring 
mist of indescribable color that clothes the oak 
trees; those fascinating flowers on the shagbark 
hickory; the opening of the box-elder's blooms — 
all these call me. The myriad sights of the May 
awakening mean much to me, and I would have 
advantage in a dual existence, or in an extended 
month, so that I might have the wild beauty of 
the hillside and the woods no less because I am 
working into shape my growing garden. 

Yet I can have some of both. In "Lovers' 
Lane," hedged with great arborvitaes, shaded from 
the ardent sun, no exotics, no garden shrubs, may 
grow. Here I have been locating the plants I love, 
and which I take, reverently, carefully, decently, 
from the wild. When the call of the woods is no 
longer to be denied, old *'Tom" is hitched up; 
boxes, papers and trowels are provided, and with 
my life-partner, who is nearly as fond of these 
nature- jewels as I am, I drive to certain favored 
haunts. Awhile we look, and listen, and inhale, 
and visit, joyously greeting our old friends all 
made fresh and new in God's spring providence; 
and then some plants are selected, hfted with the 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 71 



greatest care to take all their roots, quickly 
wrapped or packed away to avoid distresses to 
them; and we turn homeward in time to have 
these visitors bedded before sundown into a better 
place than that from which they came, if possible. 
It has long been my pride that no one shall see 
where I have thus lifted plants; for I thin out 
only, and do not exterminate. 

Although most of these my wild plant friends 
stay with me, and joyfully increase in Lovers' 
Lane, I confess to a feeling of desecration as I 
thus take from nature's garden. Yet I know that 
I leave that garden no worse, and sometimes better; 
for I return again, and see that the thinning-out 
process has been beneficial. 

Last May I heard of a great showing of the 
lovely wild Cypripedium acaule, or pink moccasin- 
flower, in a valley some miles away. A friend's 
automobile took me to the wonderful sight of 
hundreds of these woods aristocrats in full flower. 
It was a sad sight, too; for the forest that had 
sheltered them had been cut off, and this was their 
last brave blooming. The sun would soon bake 
their tender roots, and another season only the 
strongest would make a faint showing. So I dug 
them liberally, carefully, and in sorrow; for I was 
not, and am not, at all certain that they will live 



72 MY GROWING GARDEN 



in the shady corners at Breeze Hill to which in a 
few hours they were transplanted. But I have 
done my best to save for remembrance some, at 
least, of this finest of Pennsylvania orchids. At 
Eagles Mere I am sure of it, at all events. 

Those five distinctive horse-chestnuts that 
guard the Breeze Hill home, of the tree-doctoring 
of which I have written, are now in their great 
glory of bloom. I wish I knew how to picture in 
words the detailed loveliness of the horse-chest- 
nut's foot-long panicle, made up of flowers of 
complex form and dainty coloring. With the 
liriodendron or tulip, this tree may well be said to 
make blooms as fine as any orchid. 

In Lovers' Lane the conditions are not yet 
ideal. The hardships to which the great arbor- 
vitaes that inclose it were subjected before I came 
to own the place, have caused many of them to 
die. Four Norway maples had grown up in their 
very midst, crowding out the evergreens, and 
sucking dry the soil around those that survived. 
Two of the maples I have cut down and cut out, 
and their numerous progeny of husky seedlings I 
have pulled out. 

At the worst breaks in the hedges, I have 
planted native rhododendrons — after repeated fail- 
ures in the endeavor to have replacing arborvitaes 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 73 



live. To give these rhododendrons a reasonable 
chance, a trench two and a half feet deep was dug, 
close up to the intruding maples. Next the maples 
one trench was lined with heavy slates on one 
side, and in the other a cement-mortar brick wall 
was built, to keep out the hungry maple roots. 
Then these great and noble rhododendrons from 
the mountains were planted thickly in precious 
leaf-mold, better than that they came out of. A 
foot-deep mulch of leaves was put over the filled 
trench, and the hose turned in for hours. 

The rhododendrons have said "Thank you,'* 
and have gone right on blooming and growing, 
giving me a bit of the wild glory of the hills in 
June, and all the time the lovely greenery of their 
leaves. I have watched and watered and mulched 
them continually. Whenever in the days above 
freezing temperature their leaves droop, it is a 
pathetic request for a drink, and I hear, heed 
and water. 

Along the border are the wild children of the 
woods. As I cannot possibly fill it all in one 
season — ^nor do I want to — the wild blue violet 
has been permitted to spread. It will grow in any 
soil, and soon possess the neighborhood, if one is 
not ruthless and careful. But it is a wonderful 
sight these May days to see the thousands of its 



74 MY GROWING GARDEN 



blooms, in all shades of blue and violet, uplifted 
to the light. 

Of other friends of the great Pennsylvania forest 
floor I have many. In April, as I have said, came 
hepatica and bloodroot and others of the earliest. 
May gives us weeks of the dainty mertensia, 
with its sky-blue pink-edged nodding bells, and 
its broad leaves that vanish utterly before mid- 
summer. Spring beauty, Phlox divaricatay tiarella, 
rue anemone, Jack-in-the-pulpit, uvularia, two of 
the cypripediums, several trilliums — all these come 
in due time, and to our great pleasure. The wild 
columbine is naturalized and happy at the south- 
east corner, and a wealth of bloom is seen for 
weeks. From these plants are grown the "weed" 
columbines I am to tell of later. 

In other borders, on the cool north sides of 
hedges, are growing ferns from the woods of 
Eagles Mere, and the up-standing white baneberry 
annually shows us a marvel of stem color. Some 
things I can't make stay — the cardinal flower, the 
"showy orchis" that is never showy but always 
lovely, the calopogon that I really want; — ^these are 
not yet at home for me. But I have scores of little 
laurels and rhododendrons, and some mighty nice 
small hemlocks and pines, that are quite "comfy," 
and show it. One old veteran of a yew — ^the pic- 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 75 



turesque low-growing American yew, that one of 
my mountain friends calls the "fruiting hemlock" 
because of its clear carmine berries — came to me 
on a forlorn hope with some rhododendrons, and 
it is flourishing in the proper shady spot. 

For three years I have been trying to make 
comfortable several clumps of the checkerberry, 
or Mitchella, so common in Pennsylvania forests, 
but nearly as hard to successfully naturalize as 
the trailing arbutus. I had it actually growing and 
blooming in a certain spot, until an Italian laborer 
with more muscle than mind weeded it out one 
day. I weeded him out in a hurry, and then 
rescued the Mitchella; but neither that nor other 
clumps have seemed really satisfied. 

A great advantage of this old place in which I 
am growing a garden is its variety of exposures 
and facings, as well as its interesting vistas. I 
have previously mentioned the potential bigness 
of this two acres, and I am realizing it more all the 
planting and growing time. Does a shrub or plant 
need full sunshine to the east, to the south, to the 
west? It can be accommodated. Is a cool, northern 
shaded corner requisite.^ It is here. Must the 
plant have shelter from the wind.^ We have it. Is 
a half -shaded warm southern exposure desirable? 
No trouble at all ! 



76 MY GROWING GARDEN 



So there is great pleasure in selecting the right 
place, either at first or when lack of prosperity in 
growth has shown the need of a move. Such moves 
are made any time the ground is not deeply frozen, 
or too wet, and without relation to leafage, bloom- 
ing or fruiting; for with the taking of trouble 
enough, as I have previously said, anything can 
be moved at any time. Now it is not trouble, but 
pleasure, when a growing young plant is to be 
more favorably located, to first prepare the hole 
to receive it; then with two spades to get all 
around the plant where it is, deftly loosening and 
lifting it without baring a root; and then to 
promptly and gently drop it in the more com- 
fortable location, where with firming and watering 
and shading — if needed — it goes right along with- 
out check. 

May is the month when fruit flowers shame 
the purely ornamental part of the garden. The 
apricot and some of the plums have found the 
last April days favorable for opening their blos- 
soms, but it is in the first May week here that 
they give us the best of the first and finest fruit 
feast — ^that of the eyes. The cherries and the 
peaches are great globes of bloom, and they are 
just about shaking their snowy and pink petals 
to the ground when the apples begin to open. 



Plate XIII. "The apple blooms . . . the spraying game." (i 
Not open; too soon, (ii) Wide open, not fertilized; too soon, 
(ill) Calyx open and relaxed; just right for spraying, 
(iv) Calyx yet open; still right. (See page 77.) 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 77 



With these dwarf apple trees at Breeze Hill, the 
whole of the picture is in sight, and a lovely picture 
it is ! A ''near-apple," otherwise one of the crab- 
apple family, known as Pyrus or Malus floribunday 
is the especial and exquisite beauty of them all. 
Wholly covered with buds that swell and swell into 
red ovals, there comes a day when these ovals 
burst into a pink bloom that is astonishing in its 
combination of flamboyance and deUcacy. 

The apple blooms on the espalier have given 
this year a chance to really get wise to the spraying 
game. A friendly fruit-sharp has suggested that 
we watch and picture the various stages, and it 
has been done. See the cluster of blooms only 
partly open; no poison for the mean Uttle cater- 
pillar that grows into the codhn-moth could pene- 
trate. Even the wide-open cluster is not right, for 
the fertilization is not complete, and the stamens 
crowd closely upon the pistils, closing up the heart 
of the flower that is to be the heart of the fruit. 
But when the winds have blown the flowers about, 
and the bees have had their fill of the sweetness, 
incidentally brushing the pollen on to the waiting 
stigmas; when the petals, no longer useful in color 
and odor to advertise the honey that is to pay the 
bee for his help, have just fallen; when the calyx 
is open and relaxed, and the heart of the flower- 



78 MY GROWING GARDEN 



that-is-and-apple-that-is-to-be is open, then is the 
time that the waiting caterpillar stealthily crawls 
into that calyx to live there as the fruit grows, 
unless the careful sprayer has driven into this 
open calyx the lead-arsenate mist that will make 
the little worm's first meal his last one. A little 
later, the calyx will have closed upon the fertilized 
ovaries, and if no poison has met the worm, he is 
sheltered and fed at your apple-expense. 

To make sure, I have sprayed before the blos- 
soms open, in order to protect generally and to 
catch any stray bugs that eat or scales that suck; 
and again at the critical time after the blossoms 
have fallen and while the calyx is open, so as to 
both poison and protect. The first spray was a 
fine, covering mist, from at least two sides, to 
reach every part. The next, and the vital appli- 
cation, is with a coarser spray, to get right into 
the calyces where Mr. Caterpillar is or is going to 
be waiting. For both sprayings I use commercial 
lime-sulphur, with lead arsenate stirred in at 
the rate of three-fourths of an ounce to a gallon 
of the nine-to-one solution, which is a generous 
equivalent to four pounds to the hundred gal- 
lons (the hundred-gallon prescription is alarming; 
how would a plain gardenman get away with two 
barrels of this stuff .f^). 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 79 



Here I have to be tedious again, in insisting 
that this spraying operation is necessary unless I 
am to be willing to run a moth-breeding and bug- 
feeding fruit-garden; that it must be done at the 
right time and with much care to get a hme-sulphur- 
arsenate film over every part of every tree and 
into the heart of every past-blossom; and that 
to do this the mixing and filtering of the stuff 
must be managed about as if I was getting a baby's 
milk ready. No "rough-neck" operators will pro- 
tect an orchard. It isn't so much trouble, after 
all, especially after I have discovered that it is a 
positive "must" operation. 

After spraying, it is a relief to turn into the 
May garden. These stone steps, alight with the 
lovely blue periwinkle flowers that we miscall 
"myrtle" and that are really Vinca minor, remind 
me of a failure and a success, the telling of which 
will give time for the lime-sulphur smell to evapo- 
rate. I saw a similar stone step covered luxuriantly 
with the glossy foliage of the Wichuraiana rose, 
and immediately ordered such roses for the home 
steps. They came, were planted in the shade, 
between the roots of two hemlocks at the top of 
the steps where they had no business to be; grew 
a little, climbed a little, trailed not at all, and next 
year bloomed into pink Lady Gay roses, not white 



80 MY GROWING GARDEN 



single Wichuraianas. Of course I scolded the 
nurseryman; but I saw that no roses would ever 
luxuriate in the dry shade of the location. 

The next spring I went over Memorial Day to 
loved Eagles Mere of the mountains. There I 
found under some old gum trees a mass of the 
periwinkle — evidently spread from some chance 
plant brought in by a cottager, as it is a native of 
Europe and not of America. Some plants were 
lifted with care, and with even more care were on 
my return set in little pockets along those stone 
steps. Instead of just planting them along the 
slope, I gouged out a rather deep hole, filled it 
with rich soil, and planted the myrtle so that 
each plant was in the depression or recess into 
which would run any rain falling along the slope. 
The plants got busy at once, grew, spread as is 
their wont, and have made a rich evergreen mat, 
far finer than any grass I could have grown here, 
and much better than the rose I started for. 

But once down the steps, I turn aside from 
Lovers' Lane after another glimpse at the violets 
and trilliums just under the edge of the rhododen- 
drons, and pause a moment to get more pleasure 
out of the Thunberg barberry hedge, now in 
bloom. The lovely arching sprays of foliage in a 
haK-dozen shades of green are enough in them- 



Plate XIV. "The axis walk a wonder of bloom and foliage . 
always a picture vista." (See page 82.) 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 81 



selves to make me glad for this hedge, but now the 
long rows of pleasing little yellow flowers, hanging 
like bells under the twigs, strengthen my belief 
that this is a very worth-while shrub. It is plenty 
good enough as a hedge, for no mortal wearing 
trousers or skirt can get through it with clothing 
whole; it runs a veritable gamut of greens in 
earliest spring, and these dainty flowers follow; its 
berries come soon, and red, and stay red for all 
the fall and winter months; its foliage blazes early 
into reds and crimsons, long before frost; and 
after frost has taken the leaves, raindrops hang in 
tears from the red berries; while the soft snows 
and the sleet-storms do wonders with it all winter. 
It has no off days the whole year round. 

Here at the garden entrance stands that Pyrus 
florihunda I have mentioned, and not far from it 
the also previously mentioned Spircea arguta is 
yet a white fountain of spraying branches — ^for it 
ties April into May in some seasons. 

We walk into the garden along the iris border, 
now a mass of purple. What a hardy, hearty 
thing is this common "blue flag," the German 
iris! Growing almost anywhere in any soil, it is 
pleasantly formal when out of flower, and gor- 
geously informal when in bloom. I use it harshly, 
perhaps, fitting and filling with it, giving away 



82 MY GROWING GARDEN 



great clumps continually; adding varieties of 
greater delicacy from time to time; but all the 
while reveling in this fine, even if common, old 
friend of my boyhood. This same friend has, with 
the broad-leaved funkia, made part of the axis 
walk a present wonder of bloom and foliage. That 
same walk is always a picture vista. 

To the left the great old lilacs are now in their 
flower glory, and they fairly hum with busy bees. 
I have been giving loving care to the old plants, 
and they are responding. The finer varieties will 
never "touch the spot" Uke this common "lay- 
lock" of the countryside. 

OfiF to the east the strawberries are in full 
bloom; and if we didn't think of the luscious fruit 
to follow, we would better realize that as a flower- 
ing plant this would be of real value. Later, 
another strawberry, one of my weed pets, will bloom 
in yellow, and follow with its scarlet fruits that 
are entirely boy-proof, because they are tasteless. 

Not in this part of the garden, but over with 
the fruits and vegetables, there are during this 
late May two flower shows that are entirely extra, 
because the plantings were for food. The flesh 
food comes in due course, but the first crop is soul 
food, if I may so call a lovely flower display. 

The blackberry canes, as I have before said, are 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 83 



tied up to a wire trellis, in order that picking may 
be easier. Could any flowering shrub give a 
more gracious wealth of bloom than does now 
this same blackberry row? We should feel fully 
square with the plants if they did not follow with 
great clusters of glistening fruits in July. 

The other extra and much more unexpected 
picture is made for us by the plentiful and dainty 
white flowers of First of All peas. Grown as an 
"eat" and not a sweet pea, it has nevertheless 
given us a brave and beautiful show. The yet 
bare trelhs of the sweet-pea row indicates that the 
hardier vegetable has bloomed far ahead of its 
aristocratic sister. 

The first dogwoods I planted are now "showing 
me," and I hke to be shown by them! The red- 
buds associated with them are not so happy, for 
borers have killed one and choked another. Par- 
ticularly have these sly creatures worked harm to 
the Japanese red-bud, a pet of mine. 

Not very many shrubs bloom here in May. The 
fine Spircea Van Houttei follows S, arguta, and 
Deutzia gracilis, the old "Bridal Wreath," is at its 
best, together with the lovely Lemoine variety. 
Van Houttei is most useful, because it will endure 
sun or shade, drought or dampness, slope or flat, 
blooming everywhere. Just before it, the other 



84 MY GROWING GARDEN 



important barberry I have — ^the common or "vul- 
garis" — blooms; and I'm glad when it is through 
flowering, for it has a bad breath. Of course the 
mock oranges are with us; and it is of possible 
interest to note that Breeze Hill has varieties of 
Philadelphus enough to give us more than a month 
of their fine blooms, not counting on the new 
Chinese sorts, yet unbloomed. Few garden-makers 
yet know what the mock oranges will do for them. 
A late visit to the Arnold Arboretum showed me, 
last year, what I might hope for. 

In the Arboretum bed are a half-dozen new 
barberries from China, looking quite interesting, 
and one of them devilish, for it has thorns of steel 
an inch and more long. Here, too, is the earlier- 
mentioned Spircea Henryi^ one of Wilson's pets, 
delightful in its first bloom. 

The herbaceous plants give fife and light to 
the growing garden, into which we are constantly 
transplanting annuals and perennials these May 
days. Arabis, in the early weeks, is hke a hold- 
over snow-drift, and the yellow alyssum is a real 
golden glow. Another note of yellow is sounded by 
the doronicum — I wish I had more of them. A 
biennial, the old-fashioned "honesty," planted in 
the fall, is for weeks a blaze of pink and magenta. 
The first of the peonies, the lovely tenuifolia. 



Plate XV. "A gracious wealth of bloom on . . . this same 
blackberry row." (See page 83.) 



SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 85 



opens its crimson blooms in mid-May; I'm sorry 
it is so poor a grower! 

I must not forget the tulips. Long since I gave 
up the growing of early tulips, concentrating on 
some worth-while later sorts. The enduring double 
tulips, Murillo and Le Matador, have ushered us 
into the west garden entrance in dignity, and later 
the brilliant Gesneriana and the superb pink and 
white Picotee have troubled us, because we want 
to cut them to give away, and we want them as 
well to stay to be seen! The Darwins are superb, 
in their stately habit, as well as in their sur- 
prising range of unusual and delightful colors. 
Bouton d'Or is an egg of yellow on a nodding 
stem of half a yard, and it is ^'some tulip." 
This year I am looking for the bloom of some 
specialties in the damask and old rug colors found 
in the Breeders and in some Darwins, and I have 
planted so as to get good contrasts — I hope ! 

There is a very fury of vegetable activity in 
May, both of planting and of growth. We keep 
putting in corn of our pet Bantam and Golden- 
rod sorts, beans for succession, both "string" and 
limas of pole and bush designations, spinach and 
*'sich like." This year a number of experimental 
vegetables are being grown, about which I can 
write later. But one thing I need to say, and that is 



86 MY GROWING GARDEN 



that we have learned to be exceedingly cruel to the 
weeds; we kill them early and often, and the stirred 
ground is not allowed to feed their tiny roots. 

In a north corner, in almost total shade, I 
planted last year a bush of the Carolina rhodo- 
dendron sent me by my plant-friend Kelsey. It 
has bloomed this May, and it is most lovely, with 
its pinkish-white clusters of waxy flowers. It is a 
fine addition, from the Appalachian Mountains, to 
the rhododendron treasures of Breeze Hill. 

Dahlias and cannas have been a resource of my 
garden, frost-tender though they are. Planted in 
May, both give from dormant roots a superb show 
of bloom in late summer and until frost. The loose- 
petaled "cactus" dahUas seem to me most attrac- 
tive, and the cannas that have resulted from the 
patient Hfe-work of my old friend Wintzer are 
superb, distinct, and of more garden-value than 
anything of Burbank's I have seen. 

The last week of May has been for several 
years persuading us to revise the truism that 
June is the month of roses, in any exclusive sense. 
"Decoration Day" finds many mid-Pennsylvania 
gardens ablaze with the bloom of the queen of 
flowers, and my garden is among them. We enter 
June, therefore, in that mood of mind which the 
scent of roses alone can produce. 



CHAPTER VI— JUNE 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 

THE beginning of the mid-year month has 
two high points in my growing garden. One 
is a point of roses; the other of strawberries. 
We were shown, several years ago, how straw- 
berries may mean quite as much as roses. It was 
when we took up residence at Breeze Hill, the 
mansion-house still in the hands of the lingering 
mechanics. The "flitting" — ^that is, the final cut- 
ting off from the old city-street home — ^took place 
on the first day of June. All day the wagons had 
passed between the two houses, the mile of sepa- 
ration being doubled by the muddy roads. It was a 
weary couple who fronted the last load of final 
odds and ends, gathered up before the key was 
turned on the home that had been ours for more 
than eighteen years, and the old horse that drew 
us also seemed weary. Thoughtful for the morrow's 
breakfast, the good wife had me stop en route and 
buy some strawberries offered on a street stand. 
Jogging along, tired, a little "blue" from over- 
doing, we wondered as to the future in a new 

(8T) 



88 MY GROWING GARDEN 



home, which at that moment seemed notable prin- 
cipally for the inconvenience of its approaches. 
As we turned into "Lovers' Lane," then an un- 
kempt driveway, and came in sight of the west 
house-door, our neighbor, Mr. H., — whose father 
had built, thirty -five years before, the old house 
we were now to live in, — stepped out of the path 
to his home, and held up his hand to stop us. 
Then, saying ''Welcome!" he handed me a box 
of strawberries, just picked, apologizing that they 
were not larger, and telling us they were the first 
of the season from his plants. 

Not larger ! Why, there were but sixteen berries 
in the heaped-up quart of ruddy scarlet, dressed 
with fresh, soft foliage! And each one was more 
than a strawberry — it was an event! The volume 
of kindliness and friendly courtesy crowded into 
that quart box could never be measured in cubic 
contents; it was beyond any material dimension. 

Of course the sun shone for us instantly, despite 
the impending rain. Smiles broke out as we 
thanked this real neighbor for more than he ever 
knew that he gave, fine though his giving was. 
Blithely we unloaded the wagon; cheerily we took 
our way into the yet unordered new home. The 
evening was rose-colored; the blues had vanished; 
Breeze Hill was ''all right!" 



Plate XVI. Leuchstern rose: , . . "its bloom has been copious, 
exquisite, enduring." (See page 91.) 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 89 



All through the evening meal we gazed at those 
strawberries. They were entirely too good to 
eat, and no sheaf of American Beauty roses could 
have meant so much. The next morning they 
were partaken of by all the family in a sort of 
reverent pledge, as a very definite good omen, as 
a promise for the future of good — spiritual as well 
as material — from the garden, and of good will 
from our neighbor. 

That second day gave the rose high-point. In 
my goings-about on the place previous to actual 
living there, I had always to be concerned with 
the doings of mechanics. Lines for grading, and 
the general scheme for the garden, had been 
worked out on the place, yet mostly a mass of 
debris, weeds, brush, decrepit grape-vines, and 
dead pear trees. I thought I knew all about the 
growth, however; wherefore my surprise may be 
imagined when, on this second June day, the 
daughter of the house came in, saying, "Did you 
see the rose-garden?" 

No, I had not seen the rose-garden; and was 
not she joking? She waved in my direction a 
great, full flower, assuredly not a joke, and led 
me to it — the rose-garden ! In a corner east of the 
great sycamore, quite concealed from the house, 
^nd seemingly so shaded as to be all wrong for 



90 MY GROWING GARDEN 



roses, there was an irregular-shaped bed, solid 
with old-fashioned roses, and just then breaking 
into a perfect glory of bloom. One '^General Jaeq." 
there was, to my recognition; but the remainder 
were of sorts I knew nothing of. Ragged, tangled, 
thorny, overgrown, there was yet a mass of wild 
loveliness that was as delightful as it was surpris- 
ing. Thus came the second ^'Welcome," without 
words, but speaking to us that which words could 
not compass. 

Inquiry developed that these roses had been 
planted more than twenty-five years before, and 
no inquiry was needed to show the neglect through 
which they had survived. Since then, that bed of 
old roses, in that impossibly shady nook, has had 
abimdant care, and it is made over. Each year 
great canes grow up, bearing in the June-time 
rich clusters of musky fragrance, in our old-fash- 
ioned rose-garden. 

Conditions and preferences have united to give 
the rose a dominating place in this growing garden. 
I have mentioned the regret with which I gave up 
the idea of a rose-hedge, consoling myself with an 
inside hedge about a hundred feet long, and an 
arbor for climbers to weave upon, as well as with 
various beds and borders for the hybrid teas, 
polyanthas and other favorites. 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 91 



This raw, red, unfertile-looking shale seems to 
have in it something besides the liberally added 
manure that roses like, to judge by the growing 
that the climbers have done. When I look at the 
photographic record of the bare rose-arbor, made 
in September of the year we moved in, and then 
at another photograph made in June of the second 
year after, I can hardly believe what I see. And 
when I remember that the awful ten-below-zero 
winds of the next winter cut those roses down 
almost to the ground, the way they got busy and 
re-covered the arbor in one season seems also 
unbelievable. Lady Gay, Hiawatha, W. C. Egan, 
and Alberic Barbier are the names of the sisterhood 
of sturdy loveliness that have done this great 
growing and blooming. 

Leuchstern, at the eastern front of the arbor, 
has not grown so vigorously, but its bloom has 
been so copious, so exquisite, so enduring, each 
year, that I cannot ask more of it. Clusters that 
in substance and coloration surpass the rhododen- 
drons they resemble stay in perfection through 
almost two weeks, after they have been as fine as 
any ordinary rose for many days. 

My wife and I are divided as to which of the 
two dominant roses of the long hedge are most 
impressive. Both are, probably; the CHmbing 



92 MY GROWING GARDEN 



American Beauty for its size, color, form and mass 
of bloom, and the Tausendschon for its daintiness 
and variety in pink and white, as well as for its 
marvelous clusters. It was this "Thousand Beau- 
ties" rose that started the idea of the particular 
sort of rose-hedge I have worked out. At first 
the supporting wires were less than three feet 
from the ground, but my rose friend Robert Pyle 
told me, after his memorable rose-summer in 
Europe, that Tausendschon did best at its German 
home when its graceful branches might droop their 
flower-laden length from a high post. Promptly I 
set up a proper post for the rose; and then, for 
symmetry's sake, did the same at five other points. 
All the roses were viciously thorny, save only 
Tausendschon; and when I tied them up that 
winter, I saw that more spread was needed, if only 
to give chance to avoid thorns. So I bought brass 
chain, and looped it from each post summit to a 
proper point on the hedge wire to give a graceful 
slope, after which, and all through one season, the 
roses were trained into and along this weathered 
chain and the space below it. The next season 
showed the effectiveness of the plan, for the bloom- 
ing result was most beautiful. 

Near the Tausendschon, another plant of Alberic 
Barbier had been set. It has worked all through 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 93 



its neighbor and into the scheme admirably, for 
its creamy buds come almost with the rose of ten 
hundred beauties, and its darkly glossy foliage 
helps the mass effect. 

Coming later than Climbing American Beauty, 
and at another opening in the hedge, American 
Pillar has developed into a magnificent plant, 
which covers itself with great single flowers that 
range from vivid carmine to a clean pale pink, and 
that last long in loveliness. A White Dorothy 
has arched with it, and Mrs. Flight, really a pink 
rambler, blooms into the same mass. California 
has nothing on Breeze Hill in rose masses or rose 
effect during most of June ! 

Opposite Climbing American Beauty is a great 
Lady Gay, but this rose is really here quite unlady- 
like in its disposition. It seems to be a mildew- 
inviter, and my sprayings with potassium sulphide 
in the accepted English method do not seem to 
keep the Lady in good health. This means that I 
shall have to substitute another rose for this or 
any other climber that has a predisposition for 
mildew. 

Another climbing rose is "up and coming" in 
my garden. It is Excelsa, as truly American as 
the one with the Beauty name or as the Pillar 
sort. Its raiser, Mr. Walsh, is a much more useful 



94 MY GROWING GARDEN 



"wizard" than Burbank, for his roses prove out 
their quaUty, distinction and sturdiness over a 
wide range. This Excelsa is a curious red. At 
first it seems rather pale, but all at once you realize 
its brilliance, and then its complete superiority to 
Crimson Rambler, the first of this type. Excelsa 
is a wonderful grower, and it has no penchant for 
mildew. Moreover, it blooms late; in a north 
exposure on our front lawn was fine last year in 
early July. (See frontispiece.) 

When I send my memory back to the old home 
garden of thirty years ago, where Baltimore Belle 
and Prairie Queen were about the only hardy 
climbers, I see that we do much better with these 
lovely roses of now, giving us variety in habit, 
form and color, fragrance and fohage. To be sure, 
we might have an everblooming climber; but did 
you ever think, Mr. Wishful Rosarian, that when 
that desired everbloomer comes, it will not have 
the great and glorious burst of bloom that char- 
acterizes these of June fullness .^^ 

At the very beginning of the month, and indeed 
coming over from May, were shown in this garden 
the fine "rugosa hybrids," as are called those bred 
between that Japanese rose and certain favorites. 
Of them Agnes Emily Carman (what an overload 
of name for one rose!) was notable because its 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 95 



crimson blooms hung down to certain Felix Crousse 
peonies, matching almost precisely their bright 
hue. Nova Zembla was dainty in pink, and Mad. 
Georges Bruant pure in white; and all of them, 
strong, sturdy and with rich foliage, able to stand 
the hot afternoon sun in which they must open 
here. It is in this race that we are to have the 
hardy everblooming bush roses, I believe. 

The stately and full white Druschki, the con- 
tinuously performing Teplitz and all the other 
worth-while hybrid teas, have made June a very 
vigorous rose month at Breeze Hill. I find that 
visitors are likely to think most of Climbing 
American Beauty, which is probably as it should 
be; for certainly Europe never sent us so fine a 
flower, so rich a color, so sturdy a grower. That 
Irish propagator, not at all a scientific sharp, but 
very much a loving worker in roses, who at West 
Chester brought into existence this best of red 
climbing roses, has done the north a real service. 
And his fame is not dependent on one rose; for 
Christine Wright is the name of his pink beauty, 
and Purity properly designates his exquisite white 
production, rivahng American Beauty in form and 
vigor. 

But June is not all roses, by any means, in this 
growing garden. It is strawberries, as I have said. 



96 MY GROWING GARDEN 



and good strawberries, too. It is currants, and 
they are both big and good and worth while for 
their winter jam-possibihties. It is such peas as 
never came out of any market basket; for Gradus 
peas, plucked from the vines an hour before dinner, 
are not to be discussed in terms of ordinary vege- 
tables. This shortened time between the plant 
and the table seems to mean that the ordinarily 
poor, smooth, extra-early peas may be delicious as 
were the First of All that were actually first of all, 
though planted second. They matured in sixty- 
one days from planting. Then came Gradus, and 
Little Marvel; but not then the hoped-for succes- 
sion upon Mr. Kruhm's ingenious scheme. Thomas 
Laxton crept up on his date some, Potlatch forgot 
its cue, and made a false entry, while Telephone 
and Champion of England came in hand-in-hand, 
as it were, rather than tandem. There were peas 
galore for part of June, and even a pea-crank like 
myseK is satisfied with peas twice a day; but by 
July first none were available. Six weeks of peas 
was the paper scheme; two weeks and a day or so 
over the ground production. 

In June, red raspberries follow strawberries; 
and if a better raspberry than the old Cuthbert 
has appeared outside a catalogue, I don't know of 
it! My plants of the "everbearing" sort didn't 



Plate XVIII. "An ounce of Siurle^' poppy seed . . . sowed along 
an eighty-foot border ... in mid-June came 
days of poppy glory." (See page 97.) 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 97 



bear at all, so I have yet to get some knowledge of 
them. The fall-bearing strawberries — but wait till 
fall, please; this is not the place for that story. 

The old part of this growing garden gave us 
sour cherries in abundance last year, and the good 
wife put some of them into that finest of winter 
table relishes, cherry ''butter." I cannot describe 
it; there isn't any thing to compare its taste with; 
but when it comes on the table, that meal is an 
Occasion ! 

But enough of berries and peas and other flesh 
food; let me return to the real spirit of June, the 
flower spirit! Thrice I have had an over-winter 
poppy feast. An oimce of Shirley poppy seed, 
''diluted" with a pint of sifted soil, was sowed 
carefully about the second week in December along 
an eighty-foot border, next the barberry hedge. 
In May there was an hour of weeding, an hour of 
thinning; and in mid- June came days of poppy 
glory, with flowers of red and pink and white and 
salmon, all of the texture one might expect to find 
in a fairy's wings. Very early in the morning, 
before the sun was high enough to steam off the 
dewdrops, this border, with every flower fresh 
open, was something to thank God for! Forty 
cents' worth of seed, about four hours' work in all, 
for nearly fourteen days of generous bloom seemed 

6 



98 MY GROWING GARDEN 



to me very much worth while. And the third 
time was even less labor and more bloom, for I 
omitted the sowing, and the flowers that came 
anyway used some of the manure dug into that 
border after the poppy time to double their size. 
They were entirely volunteers, and seemingly with 
spirit accordingly, in contrast to the conscription 
of prosaic seed sowing. 

At a right angle to the poppy border, and also 
along the barberry hedge, a long planting of sweet 
william has been a lovely June feature. Even if it 
didn't bloom at all, this old favorite would be 
desirable because it is such a cheerful and con- 
venient ground cover, standing more shade than 
is reasonable. I am this year trying it out in 
separate colors, but I may be disappointed in the 
bloom effect — can any flower mass show more rich- 
ness than a good mixed strain of this dianthus ? 

Breeze Hill does not as yet boast of a really 
good peony garden. The reason is purely financial; 
for I find I have a troublesomely expensive taste in 
peonies, I had an idea that all these more expensive 
sorts, of the noted growers, represented principally 
the fancier's taste. I was ''shown," and by myself! 
One memorable June I went with several flower 
friends, one a language-slinging professor of horti- 
culture in an eastern college, to visit Farr's great 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 99 



six-acre peony gardens. Full of my idea, I pro- 
posed to my friends that we select, one after an- 
other, as we looked across the wonderful fields, the 
flowers that stood out as superior for some definite 
reason of form, color or bloom habit. Without 
looking at labels, we were then to walk to the 
selected plants, again discuss the "points," and if 
we agreed, we would find the label and record the 
name, also jotting down the reasons for our 
preferences. 

We selected thus some fourteen sorts out of 
fully three hundred, wrote our memoranda, and 
then hunted up Mr. Farr. Whew! Several of the 
sorts were so rare as not yet to be in commerce, 
but the others could be had — at from one dollar 
to six dollars per plant! We had not cared for 
one of the old sorts, available at the lower 
prices. So, convinced that there is something in 
the fancier's selection, I'm rather waiting until 
these that I want are within reach. Meanwhile, 
some peonies are growing splendidly for me, and 
I have had time to note that they are of a settled 
disposition, preferring not to be often moved, and 
rewarding one for much nearby manure-food. 
Indeed, much food and water at right times will 
probably give my "common" sorts strong char- 
acter and great beauty. 



100 MY GROWING GARDEN 



June is an iris month, too. Some of the German 
iris hang over from May — especially the blue-laced 
Madame Chereau, along the garden wall. The 
Spanish iris, loveHest of late-blooming fall-planted 
bulbs, gives a fine and a different show for 
little cost. It has some shadings of dull yellow, of 
smoky salmon, of ''old gold" and light brown, that 
are singularly attractive, while its blues and whites 
and lemons are clean and clear. The English iris 
follow, with mostly blue shades, and the unique 
and delightful Japanese sorts carry over into July. 
The earlier-blooming Siberian iris seems rather 
weedy in this garden. 

Herbaceous plants are in full evidence. The 
old-time valerian, or "vanilla," rears its stately 
blooms at the same time that the foxgloves are at 
their best — and a superb best! A garden without 
white foxgloves is weak. They stand up against 
the green of the arborvitses in their old-fashioned 
way. Nearby a chance combination of Campanula 
Medium and the low red heuchera is so fine that 
it must occur again. There are blues in these cam- 
panulas, and in the beautiful stokesias and ver- 
onicas, but the delphinium blues are best of all. 

The note of yellow in June is struck by the 
Oenotheras, the "evening primroses," plants of 
vigor and beauty that may quickly become weeds. 



Plate XIX. Iris: "The unique and delightful Japanese sort." 
(Sed fvfcige 100.) 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 101 



Hemerocallis and coreopsis carry the same hue, 
while the lychnis touches the border with scarlet. 

The lovely white Lilium candidum comes into 
full stateliness here past the middle of June, and 
is not merely desirable in itseK, but because it 
lends light and contrast to anything near it. I 
want more; but it increases rather slowly. Not 
far away, and blooming about the same time, the 
long-spurred columbines are a great pleasure. The 
Boston strain I have grown gives colors so soft 
and refined that the bed of them has the same 
effect of richness that one sees in those flowers of 
wool that the old eastern devotees created in a 
prayer-rug. These columbines last long, too; for 
many weeks there will be flowers in abundance. 

I am fond of gladioH, but have had to plant 
them very late to avoid the vacation weeks. 
Loving this growing garden as we do, we cannot 
quite stay away from Eagles Mere, our Penn- 
sylvania mountain summer home; wherefore there 
is needed especially careful planning and planting 
to give us September "posies," and not to have 
our favorites fall into flower in late July or August. 
I find that gladioli planted the last week in June 
come into bloom in September. 

The cannas, planted early in the month, begin 
to grow vigorously as the ground gets thoroughly 



m MY GROWING GARDEN 



warm. I have those wonderful ''Hly"-cannas origi- 
nated by that cunning plant-worker, Antoine 
Wintzer, and they are worth having, assuredly. 

June is surely a shrub month too! Greatest of 
all is the rhododendron, toward the end of the 
month, in its waxy elegance. Just ahead my few 
plants of the laurel — which is to be the national 
flower of America if my friend Henry Turner 
Bailey can have his wise way — give their corner 
a pink and white glow. They need, I observe, 
some sun to bloom well; the more complaisant 
rhododendron will illumine almost total shade 
with its blooms. Both must have leaf -mulch 
about their roots to prosper here, and the hose 
has soaked those roots several times in June. 

The later Ulacs and mock oranges are to be seen, 
and the weigelas and spireas. Of the latter, the 
new Chinese sort, Spiroea Henryi, previously men- 
tioned, has bloomed, this month, in a most distinct 
and attractive way, and is undoubtedly a really 
valuable addition. 

I am especially proud of a lovely Styrax japonica 
that is growing freely, and blooming its dainty 
bells as it grows; for it is one of the over- 
looked shrubs. It flourishes here in a half -shaded 
corner, somewhat sheltered from the cruel west 
wind. 



THE FEAST OF FLOWERS 103 



Not to specifically mention one mock orange, 
Philadelphus Lemoinei var. Avalanche, would be 
unjust to it and to my garden friends. It is one 
of the sorts "made in France," but from two 
American species, by the patient wonder-worker 
at Nancy. The name "Avalanche" describes it 
fully; it is a snowstorm, a cascade of white flowers 
for two weeks. There are other of these Lemoine 
mock-oranges coming along, extending the sea- 
son and showing desirable variations in size psiid 
form of flower. I am inclined to believe that a 
proper selection of the Philadelphuses will give 
more delightful and fragrant white flowers in 
early summer than most planters suspect. 

The Japanese honeysuckle is a weed in the 
neighborhood of Breeze Hill, having evidently 
"escaped" years ago. One great specimen has 
flung its persistent branches and tendrils over a 
nearly rotten tree-stump right at the carriage 
stone, and it has been most of June almost intoxi- 
cating both to the eye and the nose. I have 
propped the old stump, and pruned the old honey- 
suckle, hoping to have both last long. Along 
the curved Hillside Road front of the Breeze Hill 
boundary, outside, this same honeysuckle has 
made green and lovely a rough shale slope. 

The garden is an exacting mistress in June, and 



104 MY GROWING GARDEN 



sometimes when I straighten my aching back, and 
drop the hoe or the hose, I wish I might be visit- 
ing it rather than working in it. And I note its 
deficiencies and failures and diflSculties all too 
clearly, I suppose, inasmuch as visitors pass them 
by, either from charity or ignorance, or both. 
But when I look about and see it grow under my 
unacquainted hands; when I have the fine pleas- 
ure each morning of seeing what God's way in a 
garden is, in the birth of some jewel of his over 
night; when I inhale the fragrant breath of the 
new-mown lawn, or get at even the soft incense that 
only then arises from the ground; then I know 
that the work is all profit, and the weariness a 
trifle. I am in, and of, a growing garden ! 



Plate XX. "The Japanese honeysuckle . . . has flung its 

branches and tendrils over a tree-stump." (See page 103.) 



CHAPTER VII— JULY 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 

"AND the Lord God planted a garden east- 
/"A ward in Eden; . . . and out of the ground 
made the Lord God to grow every tree that 
is pleasant to the sight, and good for food." So 
runs the story of the first garden on this earth, 
which I here transcribe to call attention to the 
order of importance attached to its product. 
"Pleasant to the sight" — that came first in a gar- 
den — and then ''good for food." Man was to have 
his garden, if he followed the example of the 
Creator, first a delight to see, and then productive 
of the necessaries of life. 

If any authority were needed for treating of 
flowers first in my growing garden, it would thus 
be easy to cite. I do cite it, however, not merely 
to put food in its proper relation, but to put it in at 
all. Many who think they love gardens aflFect to 
despise the vegetables and the fruits, and thus miss 
the completeness that God's garden predicated, 
both in beauty and in usefulness. 

In a notable way, and with an enlarged vision, 

(105) 



106 MY GROWING GARDEN 



both eye and appetite may be served simulta- 
neously. A garden of vegetables is to me a beautiful 
thing, if it is a good garden. The tendrils of the 
pea that is sweet to the taste are as daintily cling- 
ing, and as I have before said and shown, its 
flowers are but less conspicuous than those of the 
pea that is wholly ornamental. Few plants in the 
flower border produce foliage so delicately cut or so 
decorative in greenery as that of the carrot. Yellow 
beans are handsome as they hang from well- 
grown plants, and a row or a field of celery is a 
pleasing sight. Well-trained tomato plants, hung 
with red fruits, are brilliantly decorative, and 
peppers are as much so. And what exotic even 
approaches the stately tropical beauty of maize, 
or corn; what sight in any flower garden, or what 
scent, surpasses the sight and the scent of that same 
corn as the morning breeze of a warm summer day 
plays over it.^^ 

I have stoutly maintained that from the appear- 
ance standpoint I have a complete right to mix 
my plantings of vegetables and flowers and fruits, 
if I like. So parsley has, in my growing garden, 
edged a border, and lettuce as well; so the prize 
row of sweet peas ran next a row of grape-vines 
one year; so the cosmos succeeded and supple- 
mented the foliage of the asparagus border; so my 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 107 



pet poppy bed of four-score feet has been close to 
a planting of potatoes. 

Alas, the potato! Writing the word brings 
mournful memory of my repeated and increas- 
ingly disastrous potato failures. The first spring at 
Breeze Hill potatoes were planted as a matter of 
course, and a moderate crop secured. The second 
season they were planted as a matter of winter 
food; more of them, in better ground; but the bugs, 
allowed to get a start, made the result mediocre. 
The third season I took much trouble to see to it 
that conditions were right, as I thought, for a 
model potato crop. The early showing was most 
good-looking and promising, being seemingly about 
ideal. Bugs came, but were promptly picked or 
poisoned. Then suddenly the blight descended, 
and just wiped out that potato patch, despite 
frantic spraying. 

Last season, my combativeness aroused, I took 
every possible precaution in preparing to grow a 
small area of potatoes on the intensive plan. 
Fresh ground, the best on the place, subsoiled with 
dynamite; an approved chemical fertilizer; selected 
seed, carefully cut; planting of the most pains- 
taking character. All these, and then opportune 
rains to start the tubers — but they didn't start 
to any reasonable extent. The vacant spaces were 



108 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



replanted with seed soaked in formalin to ward 
off "scab," and as any foliage got four or five 
inches high it was sprayed and sprayed and 
sprayed. Bugs? They never had a chance ! Weeds? 
Neither did they have any peace in which to start 
or to grow. But eventual potatoes? Not so many 
as went into the ground as seed, alas ! 

Of course I have not lacked the telling why, 
from many wiseacres. Ground too rich, ground 
too poor; fertilizer should have been strewn to the 
left instead of the right; planted in the wrong 
aspect of the moon; they were grown flat, they 
were hilled too much; too much cultivating, too 
much spraying — and so on. But when the con- 
ditions were carefully detailed to a competent 
Cornell professor, he frankly said he didn't know 
why, except that none of the reasons I have men- 
tioned were effective. 

This year I am growing my potatoes somewhere 
else, with plain "greenback" fertilizer, permitting 
some one else to do the spraying and the "bug- 
ging." I have planted a row of one of the very early 
sorts, in the hope that such a little bit of a planting 
may miss the blight patrols, and allow us to have 
for the July table those smooth little tubers, half- 
grown, that are a delicacy rather than a food 
staple. 




good garden." (See page 106.) 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 109 



Really, the title of this chapter is inaccurate, 
for we do not have in July a '"feast" of vegetables 
in the sense of variety — that comes in September, 
after we are home from Eagles Mere, and when 
some weeks of hotel eating, with the can-opener 
working overtime, have prepared us to appreciate 
the fresh delights of our home garden. Yet July 
is a feast month for vegetables, because it opens 
the season for several that we hke. The first 
"string" beans — so called, I presume, because we 
wouldn't touch them if they weren't entirely 
stringless! — are now available, and are good to 
eat; very good. Always we grow too many of 
them, and give away too few, so that there is a 
waste of good food. Why could I hand my friend 
a good cigar — if I used the dead things myseM! — ■ 
with assurance of his courteous acceptance, and be 
afraid to send him enough crisp yellow beans to 
give him and his family a vegetable treat they can 
not obtain for themselves in any market? His 
wife will eat contentedly of a box of candy on the 
hving-room table when she calls, but might enter- 
tain the suspicion that we were considering her an 
object of charity if we offered her a bunch of fresh, 
crisp radishes, ten minutes out of the ground. 
Something is wrong in our sense of proportion, I 
think. Perhaps I shall acquu^e courage eventually, 



110 MY GROWING GARDEN 



to contribute surplus vegetables to the tables of 
my friends, just as I now gladly cut for them the 
more difficult flowers which they as gladly carry 
away. 

In the garden of my boyhood home there was 
a tradition that "roasting ears" of sweet corn — 
which were never roasted — might be had by 
July fourth, to celebrate Independence Day. 
Sweet corn by name, but not by nature, is in the 
markets here in early July, but the real thing does 
not happen often before mid-month. One year I 
hurried up some corn grains in pots by planting 
them in my good neighbor's greenhouse, and \4sions 
of early maturity possessed me, notwithstanding 
a wiseacre statement that corn could not be trans- 
planted. It was transplanted, when the ground 
was of a kindly temperatm^e, and it grew. But 
strange to say, the outdoor-sown &st planting of the 
same sort grew faster, much faster; and yet stranger 
to say, the poor-gi^owing early transplanted corn 
formed ears sooner, and did give us our first taste 
about five days ahead of the far lustier natural 
planting ! 

That first taste of Golden Bantam com — how 
sweet, how toothsome, how entirely dehcious! 
That is, if it is picked in the home garden, not 
more than an hour before it makes its steaming 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 111 



appearance upon the table; I am not referring to 
mere market or restaurant corn, such as gardenless 
unfortunates must put up with. The home-raised 
article pays more of the debt my garden owes me 
than any other of its productions, I am sure; and I 
am intending to have a large debit balance of that 
sort here, with these excellent yellow sorts matur- 
ing in succession. Goldenrod has been as dehght- 
ful to eat, and somewhat more liberal in its pro- 
duction; but the very earhest must be the saucy 
Bantam. 

During later July the bush lima beans come 
into sufficient size to be used, and they mark the 
second high point of garden reward for the month. 
Like sweet corn and peas, these beans lose flavor 
rapidly after they are picked, and we figure at 
Breeze Hill to have no advance gathering, but to 
hurry them from the plants through the kitchen 
to the table. Between the lima beans of any out- 
rageous-priced metropolitan restaurant and these 
confections of my garden there is a difference as 
between a poor picture of a rose and the actual 
flower. There is a resemblance of appearance only, 
but not of satisfaction. 

Why is it that some great restaurant in a great 
city does not specialize on fresh, really fresh, vege- 
tables, well cooked, and not doped with sauces so 



112 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



that one can notice little difference between peas 
and potatoes? The existing exalted prices might 
even be increased, if there was the intention to 
produce the article, so far as it could be produced. 
The prevailing idea of the restaurateurs seems to 
be to make vegetables so undesirable in taste, and 
so costly in money, that they will entirely give 
way to flesh foods. Of course, in this unwar- 
ranted observation I am referring only to the 
grosser and transportable vegetables like some 
beans, carrots, cabbage, cauliflow^er, potatoes and 
the hke, and not to the higher literature, so to 
speak, of evanescently flavored peas, beans, corn 
and some others — they belong only to the actual 
gardeners, and are quite impossible to ordinary 
commerce. 

Celery has proved to be one of the vegetables 
that find encouraging conditions in the rough shale 
of this garden. In this July month it is our custom 
to transplant several rows of the previously grown 
little "celeriets," and to watch them and to water 
them with the completest care until they are 
accustomed to the change and enjoying the hot 
sun. At first I had deep trenches dug, with the cor- 
responding deeper soil preparation, so that the 
little plants were in a narrow valley until the 
laborious ''earthing" later had leveled them. This 




Plate XXII. "Consider the hollyhock; how it grows!' 
(See page 120.) 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 113 



is no longer the plan pursued; for careful tests 
showed no superiority in the final product, and 
there was a deal of back-breaking labor required to 
do the filling properly. Hereafter I will use level 
culture altogether, with all the manure in the soil 
that will seem to mix with it. The little plants will 
be carefully sorted as to size, and as carefully 
trimmed in both root and top, so that the first 
hard days may not require so much water trans- 
piration. If Jupiter Pluvius favors us with a con- 
venient shower, that will prosper the planting; 
but Aqua Susquekanniensis applied through a 
hose and by way of the notable ''lawn-mist" 
sprinkler, that makes w^ater dust to float through 
the air to the ground, w411 do nearly as well. There 
are enough partly read daily newspapers to do 
any needed shading service for a day or so, and 
thus to justify themselves more completely of their 
lurid news, which won't hurt the celery ! 

July is a berry month here. The first days see 
the end of an abundant strawberry crop, usually, 
though last year those fall-bearers; — but there, 
I'm getting ahead of my story again ! There have 
been more of those delicious Cuthbert raspberries, 
and a great crop of blackberries. Both the latter 
have done better, and are less cruel to the picker 
with their thorns, since I have tied them down 

H 



114 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



upon a simple wire trellis, about three feet high. 
In the Maytime, the blackberry row, which runs 
close to the barberry hedge, was, as I have pic- 
tured previously, a mass of white blossoms quite 
as decorative as anything planted primarily for 
decoration; and these great clusters of ripening 
fruit, set about with luxuriant fohage, now give a 
more colorful decoration. 

The young bunches of grapes need bagging 
attention before mid-July. Each year convinces 
more completely of the value of inserting the cluster 
of little green globes into a grocer's two-pound bag, 
which is torn down at the top about an inch in two 
places, folded carefully over the bunch-carrying 
twig, and then pinned fast with two pins — brass 
pins if you are likely to get temper-ruffled at the 
prick of a rusty iron pin in the fall. The grapes are 
thus protected against bugs, birds and bipeds, 
at least partially; and they ripen more completely, 
have thinner skin, sweeter juice, and will keep 
many weeks longer. 

The apricot tree, carefully sprayed, has given 
us some fine fruit this month, and that incidental 
mulberry has begun its rather long tour of fruit- 
ing duty. It has the pleasant way of ripening its 
berries in succession, so that about any time for a 
month I may be sure of finding them within reach 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 115 



overhead in just the exact and spicily dehcious 
state of pre-ripeness that I hke. Above in the tree 
the birds see that none go to waste, but below 
many fall to the ground in that over-ripeness which 
has given the mulberry a poor reputation. 

Writing of birds reminds me that last year the 
blackbirds, otherwise called the purple grackles, 
and more often and quite properly ' called a con- 
founded nuisance, departed in a body on July first. 
Their absence is most gratifying; for their habits 
are not nice, their noise is most unmelodious, 
and their impudence quite aggravating. I have 
been awakened at three o'clock in the morning by 
the beginning of their squawking overture, the last 
notes of which had been heard long after sun- 
down the night before. When hundreds have set- 
tled at once in the "front" horse-chestnut, the 
hose has been turned upon them, to their enjoy- 
ment; and a vicious-looking moving scarecrow in 
the big sycamore merely formed for them a satis- 
factory roost. My bird-friends, the inveterate 
Audubonists Mrs. Wright and Mr. Chapman, 
both recommend a shot-gun; but here my nerve 
fails! 

These grackles have not been able either to 
scare away or starve out all the other and better 
birds. The many robins that have evidently con- 



116 MY GROWING GARDEN 



sidered this place home for a long time are quite 
able to hold their own against the glossy black 
noise-makers. The robins are extraordinarily tame, 
and build nests where they oughtn't to. One was 
in a corner of the rose-arbor, within easy reach, 
and where Mrs. Robin felt it at first necessary 
to get off her eggs and address remarks to me 
every time I walked through the arbor. She 
accepted me as part of the scenery, after a while, 
but flew and scolded for others. Another, even 
more daringly arranged her egg-home inside the 
big Climbing American Beauty rose, right at the 
sun-dial center of garden traflBc, and she surely 
had an abundance of exercise while incubating, as 
visitors passed within three feet ! Yet another con- 
cluded that the one suitable place for her family- 
rearing work was the branch of a Norway spruce 
overhanging the walk to the kitchen door along 
which passed the butcher, the baker, the ice-man 
and other service visitors. But, somehow, in 
God's bird providence, they all pulled through. 

It is my good wife who is bird-wise, not I. She 
notes the first golden flash of the oriole, and sees 
the brown creeper and the nuthatch chase up and 
down the tree trunks. To my duller eyes she 
showed the brown thrasher, on his first melodious 
visit; but I didn't need her help to hear the flicker 



Plate XXIII. "At the beginning of the month the great 
rhododendron is in full bloom." (See page 117.) 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 117 



set off his alarm-clock on the tin roof at 3.20 a.m. 
The rascal! He does it because he enjoys the 
fine effect he can thus produce as compared with 
his proper love-drumming upon a hollow tree. Our 
neighbor was completely taken in by this stylish 
fellow's rat-a-tat-tat at the same early hour. His 
wife heard what she supposed was an emergency 
knock at the door by someone who couldn't 
find the electric bell-button in the dim dawn, and 
she aroused her drowsy ^ 'hubby." Just as he 
reached consciousness, Mr. Fhcker knocked again, 
and my friend, hastily opening the window, called 
out "Who's there which of course insured the 
silence of the tapping aviator. Grumblingly Mr. 

T repeated his query, adding a few somewhat 

inelegant remarks about anyone who would knock 
and not answer, before he again hit his pillow. It 
was later that day, upon comparing notes, that he 
learned just who his caller was, somewhat to his 
discomfiture. 

All spring and summer the birds are a joy at 
Breeze Hill, which has evidently, by reason of its 
large trees, long been on the northern Riviera of the 
summer migration route. We are glad ! 

At the beginning of the month the great rho- 
dodendron — Rhododendron maximum — is in full 
bloom. With the particular and painstaking trans- 



118 MY GROWING GARDEN 



planting before described, I have been able to 
make this regal evergreen shrub feel very much at 
home at Breeze Hill. Would anyone suppose that 
these great plants had been only fifteen months 
away from the wild? And how they help in the 
working out of my picture vistas ! 

That worth-while hydrangea, the one with the 
portentous botanical cognomen of H, arhorescens 
var. grandiflora, is in full flower in early July. It is 
far more graceful than the common paniculata 
grandiflora which has been so greatly overplanted 
in the United States, and blooms earlier. In a 
half -shady place where the morning sun reaches it, 
it grows rapidly and blooms superbly. ''Hills of 
Snow" is one impossible "common" name it 
suffers under; and various nurserymen hitch vari- 
ous adjectives to it in addition. Sometimes it has 
the botanical name of Hydrangea arhorescens 
sterilis, but according to Professor Sargent the 
grandiflora name is the proper one. 

Name aside, it is a most excellent shrub, with 
many merits. I find that it resents full sun, and 
that with morning shade and afternoon sun it is 
quite uncomfortable. It will bloom and grow in 
nearly complete shade, though not so vigorously. 

Some other early hydrangeas are in the Arbore- 
tum bed, and stray blooms suggest their value when 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 119 



large enough to develop character. The lovely- 
native radiata has flourished since I moved it from 
its place in the sun, giving its pleasing flowers in 
early July, and its more pleasing leaf show every 
time the breeze turned their silver under sides 
upward for a moment. 

A July shrub notability in this part of the world 
is the bloom of the dwarf horse-chestnut — Msculus 
parviflora. It is most striking and impressive, 
even on the little plant that took three years to 
start, and then astonished us this July. 

Of the pink summer-blooming spireas, Anthony 
Waterer and Margaritse are worth while, because 
they add color, while providing no such burst of 
bloom as do the spring-blooming varieties. 

The sweet peas give us their opening effort 
right after July fourth. In the Breeze Hill years 
the results have been various, but never entirely 
bad. One year the two-foot trench, the rich soil, 
the trellis and the weather — especially the latter — 
were evidently quite pleasing to Madame Sweet 
Pea, for she came early and numerously, and 
stayed long with us. Of a July morning, before Old 
Sol had gotten into his full heat-stride, the mass of 
new-opened and really sweet pea-flowers was as 
showy as the June blackberry-row blossoms, and 
far more interesting in detail. These newer Spen- 



120 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



cer sorts are wonderfully fine and large. As I have 
previously remarked, I now prefer more, of less 
sorts, rather than to grow many kinds. 

We pick, and pick, and pick these sweet peas, 
knowing full well that they will give us more 
flowers if we take more, and fewer if we permit 
nature to quickly complete the reproductive cycle 
by making seeds. Yet they get away from us; for 
the bloom abundance is surprising. 

I have tried to imitate the presumably perfect 
EngHsh methods by deep preparation, rich soil, 
plenty of water; and, after the plants are in bud, 
by a heavy mulch of dried grass to shade the soil 
and keep the roots cool. Yet before long the vines 
die out along the lower part, and the flowers soon 
dry up. What matter.^ We've had a perfect glory 
of bloom, and sweet peas galore have graced our 
home and the homes of our friends. 

Consider the hollyhock; how it grows ! It seems 
both to toil and to spin, and then in result to be 
clothed in a gorgeousness to which the Solomon's 
glory would be mere manufacture. It is called an 
''old-fashioned" flower, for some reason, as if there 
were any really new-fashioned flowers on this old 
earth; yet the hollyhocks of today are entirely 
''up-to-date" in clear color, fine form and in the 
plant's stately habit. It is the finest of the spire- 



THE FEAST OF VEGETABLES 121 



like plants of ready growth. My hollyhocks 
are all descended from one strain of seed sown 
five years ago, and not yet deteriorating. Some 
years the old plants seem intending to be per- 
ennial, but I am safe in sowing seed every year 
upon the basis of a biennial treatment of the 
hollyhock. 

The "Shasta" daisy — a Burbanked form of the 
field daisy — is a fine July flower, which if often 
transplanted and divided, and given much manure 
and much water, will in reward produce a sheet 
of glorified blooms worth having. It holds the 
center of the garden stage in July, and it is sup- 
ported by salpiglossis and other good annuals. 
About the same time Miss Petunia makes her 
bow, and a pleasant courtesy it is, repeated daily 
until Jack Frost stiffens her bloom muscles. 

"My Lady Nicotine" refers to a smelly pipe, I 
believe, in literary truth; but I prefer to attach 
that name to the delightful sweet nicotiana, 
which also in July begins its daily evening per- 
formance, to last until the same Mr. J. Frost 
assumes entire charge. In the half-hour follow- 
ing the summer sunset, if the evening is still, 
there pervades in the garden the fragrance of this 
better tobacco, and its white flowers that open 
only when the sun has declined are as the garments 



122 MY GROWING GARDEN 



of a fairy. On summer moonlight nights this Lady 
Nicotine is queen of the fairies, indeed ! 

The nicotiana comes easily enough, for once 
planted, it seeds itself into the ground, to ofiFer 
next spring any quantity of young plants. 

The tall and stately perennial delphiniums 
were a point of garden interest through June and 
until mid -July, as they dominated the "blue 
bed.'* I wish I had more of them! I had; about a 
thousand seedlings from selected jflowers formed a 
moonlight meal for several predaceous snails one 
season, and I have lost a season since. By the 
way, I have cut off the spent stems, right to the 
ground, in the main delphinium bed, added some 
encouraging sheep-manure and bone dust, and in 
consequence can almost see the new stems grow. 

Hardy phlox is not yet right in my garden. It 
blooms, but not so prosperously as it ought to. I 
have expectations and hopes! But I do have, 
even in July, the first scarlet plumes of Salvia 
splendens, and the rich blue blooms of its sister 
S. patens. They serve to carry along the bloom 
time in a month not very floriferous, because the 
sun is too ardent. July is midsummer, and the 
leaf greens are now in full and fine maturity. 



CHAPTER VIII— AUGUST 



SOBER SUMMER 

THE foliage of summer is generally mature, 
green, sober. There is a certain warmth 
and gaiety about the leaf progress of June 
and early July, and a vast variety in shades, as 
well, so that any body of trees and shrubs of vary- 
ing kinds will display anything from the youngest 
light yellow leaves of the Norway maples to the 
deep, even green of the horse-chestnuts. Toward 
the first of August the leaves are quite or nearly 
full-grown, and they have settled down to their 
real work of elaborating food for the trees that 
bear them. 

My water-color friend. Little, finds in this color 
maturity another confirmation of his theory that 
there is a sort of color compensation, a chromatic 
balance, of the seasons. In spring, the air and the 
ground are cool, though slowly absorbing heat, and 
the leaves and flowers are warm in hue — ^there 
are the really hot colors of the tulips, the yellows of 
some tree blossoms, and so on. As the season 
warms, the foliage and flower hues become in 

(123) 



124 MY GROWING GARDEN 



general cooler, until in summer we have the deep 
green of mature leaves, the deep blue of the white- 
dotted sky, and the blues and whites of the garden. 
When cooler nights begin to come, the summer 
foliage is likely to assume hints of brown, the corn 
takes on the colors of maturity, and we have the 
decidedly warm-hued chrysanthemums, purple 
asters and the like to compensate. The sharp 
weather of winter demands all possible heat from 
nature's color scheme, and we have it in the 
browned leaf following the brilliant hues of 
autumn, in the corn shock and the bare tree 
stem, and even in the shadows on the snow. 

Such is the theory, and it seems logical to me, 
though I have heard it derided, not at all to my 
discomfort — unless in August, the month when 
sense as well as theory demands coolness in lan- 
guage, in the breakfast melon, and anywhere else 
we can get it. 

This theory takes no account of abnormal 
colors in foliage. That imwholesome-looking shrub, 
the golden-leaved elder, and the other jaundice- 
foliaged abnormalities, are not included, because 
they are not natural. To me these yellow-leaved 
affairs are repellant, because they look as if the 
plant lacked blood, and was unable to get enough 
chlorophyl pumped up from its roots to make a 



SOBER SUMMER 



125 



decent showing. Why advertise such an apparent 
deficiency? 

Nor have I fallen in love with the Burbank 
"Rainbow" corn, with its streaks of red and white 
and pink, for it adds no color note of value, and 
has no special beauty of form. If one tries out 
garden freaks by William Morris's prescription, 
the case of the corn will be quite easily settled. 
Morris said, "Have nothing about you that you do 
not know to be useful or beheve to be beautiful." 
There is certainly no use in this rainbow stufiF, and 
it is not beautiful to my eyes; therefore it will not 
be in the garden again. 

The expensive Colorado blue spruce is another 
of these over-loud growths that needs at least to 
be used with great care. I have seen it in its 
native Rocky Mountain habitat, along river 
slopes, where it was the exclamation point in a 
mass of the deep green Engelmann spruce, and 
there it was very beautiful. I have also seen it in 
well-considered and rather extensive evergreen 
plantings in the east, used also as a color point, for 
emphasis and shading, and again it was beautiful. 
But planted as it frequently is, as the chief feature 
of a lawn, standing out alone and away from other 
evergreens, it advertises only the desire of the 
gardener to show that he is willing to wear a red 



126 MY GROWING GARDEN 



necktie with a dress suit! Anyway, a far more 
soft and pleasing note of color variation in ever- 
green foliage is given by the lovely Concolor fir, 
or by the blue form of the Douglas fir, both of 
which are of a distinctly attractive form. 

In August I am but an occasional visitor at 
Breeze Hill. Long settled habit takes us all to 
the cottage at Eagles Mere, nestled into the edge 
of the primeval forest, and not far from a lake 
that cools, charms and holds us. It is my yearly 
opportunity to renew acquaintance with the won- 
drous flora of the forest floor, to live among the 
trees that were old when Columbus discovered 
America, to see how God's garden works out with 
all time and all nature at command. I have 
traveled to many forests, east, west, south, never 
to find one so richly attractive as this in the 
Pennsylvania AUeghanies, a half-mile high, and 
with its marvelous laurels and rhododendrons, its 
great huckleberries and viburnums, its giant hem- 
locks and maples and birches. The "going" in 
the trackless depths at Eagles Mere is as toilsome 
and adventurous as any I have ever found, and 
far more interesting and strenuous than the 
traversing of the Rockies or the Sierras. Here, free 
from regular duties, with a wondrous night canopy, 
I am awakened in the morning by the hermit 



SOBER SUMMER 



127 



thrush, and all day — until the later days of the 
month — may hear the songs of many birds. 

But I cannot wholly abandon my growing gar- 
den. At least twice during the month I return to 
enjoy the change, to revel in the dehcious and 
uncanned fruit of the vegetable-garden, and to 
keep "tab" on the place generally. As I have 
previously written, the garden is planned to 
reserve its best until we are again home, in Sep- 
tember; yet Nature is so kind to the growing 
garden that August is a bloom month as well as a 
fruit month and a vegetable month. 

One August there had been a week or more of 
unusually cool and wet weather, which resulted in 
finding the roses enjoying new vigor, when I came 
home on the eleventh day of the month. Hot, 
dry weather does not prove congenial to the queen 
of flowers, and August is usually of that sort. 
The hateful "black spot" has removed most of the 
leaves, in several such seasons, and mildew is also 
destroyingly in evidence. Spraying does not get 
so well done in this gardenerless garden when the 
"boss" is away, and it is difficult indeed to keep 
the roses, particularly the hybrid teas, healthy 
and growing. At such seasons I envy England's 
rose climate of cool nights and continual moisture. 

Another year, the first August visit showed me 



128 MY GROWING GARDEN 



the success of a scheme to compete with the hmi- 
gry, thirsty, energetic roots of the Norway maple 
that marks and dominates the western border of 
the ^ ^formal" garden. This big maple shades most 
satisfactorily a place where visitors may sit in 
comfort to look over the garden. (Visitors only; 
the *'boss" has never time to sit in comfort in 
this garden!) I had tried all sorts of things that 
might be expected to grow under this tree, but 
none of them did it. Finally I paved the central 
area with irregular brown-stone flags, laid with 
wide joints to admit water. This solved the prob- 
lem as far as it went, but those same fibrous roots 
kept reaching out for water and fertility beyond on 
the two sides not boimded by a stone wall. It 
occurred to me that I might succeed with the 
scarlet sage, backed up by African marigolds; 
wherefore in June the larger bed to the east was 
transplanted full of these. The return in mid- 
August showed that the Salvia *'Bonfire" was 
kindling, and although the plants leaned well 
toward the sun, they, and the marigolds back of 
them, grew and blossomed most beautifully and 
most brilliantly until frost. 

The other angle within the root influence gave 
opportunity to try an experiment in the survival 
of the strongest. There was reason on this south 



Plate XXV. "The China asters . . . especially the King sorts 
that reign over the border along the axis walk." (See page 152.) 



SOBER SUMMER 



side for a low screen from the central walk, and I 
planted the fearfully persistent Bocconia cordata, 
or plume poppy, next the flagstone pavement, 
with the scarcely less persistent Shasta daisies 
next, edging the combination with petunias, them- 
selves usually quite able to hold their own. "Let 
them fight it out among themselves," I said to 
my son, as we finished the planting. 

Now I find they seem to have arranged a sort 
of entente cordiale, for all three families are dwelHng 
together in apparent content and in considerable 
beauty. The bocconia shows its attractive plumes 
and its no less attractive fig-like leaves in com- 
fortable height, the Shasta daisy has bloomed 
abundantly, and the petunias are rich in fringed 
flowers. True, the yellow roots of the bocconia 
have appeared outside the stone wall, and must 
be ruthlessly chopped out if I hope to confine this 
energetic plant to its designated place, but this is 
not much bother. It is a good part of the fun of 
growing a garden to try out plants here and there, 
to pit one against another sometimes, and thus to 
work toward being master of the garden. 

The so-called "China" asters, which are botani- 
cally not asters, but callistephus, are August and 
September bloomers at Breeze Hill, and each year 
we "do" them better, as the professional gardener 



130 MY GROWING GARDEN 



puts it. With their colors in all the cyanic range 
of pink, purple, crimson and white; with their 
forms of flatness or roundness, of regularity or 
informality, of singleness or doubleness; with their 
accommodating disposition as to transplanting, 
soil and blooming, it would be difficult to name 
any more desirable annual. Last year it was the 
"King" varieties that pleased us most, but all 
were good to see, good to have and good to give 
away. The seed was sown in mid-March, in the 
neighbor's greenhouse, and the little seedlings 
transplanted twice. My son is rather an aster 
crank; and he seems to think that the half-trowelful 
of wood-ashes he digs into the ground around each 
plant when the asters are put where they are to 
bloom is of real value. 

There is a nasty, agile and persistent bug that 
bothers the China aster. If and when he comes, 
war must be declared at once, with no parleying 
and no diplomatic hedging or "watchful waiting." 
A can with an inch of kerosene in it; a careful, 
quick shake of the plant so that the shiny black 
little devil drops headlong into it — and he is dead. 
Early in the morning is best for the funeral, because 
the corpse-elect is less gymnastic before the sun is 
high. But any time will do for the massacre, and 
every time is best until all are dead. It is a per- 



SOBER SUMMER 



131 



fectly simple proposition; either you kill all these 
"aster beetles," or the beetles eat out and destroy 
all your asters. No spraying, no powdering, no 
anything but a petroleum bath ! 

I had been puzzled to know why the tiger 
liHes that seemed so well pleased for two years, in 
the long border along the axis walk, are now 
quietly getting away. It is a habit lilies have, I 
know; but I thought this variety, which I have 
seen in great beds, apparently decades old, would 
stay with me. The situation was seemingly just 
right, but "'Chinese" Wilson's fine treatise on the 
lily family, which I have just read, convinces me 
even more fully of my ignorance. The bloom this 
August is scanty and weak, and the apparent 
reason is that I have the bulbs in a really damp 
place, whereas Mr. Wilson insists that they must 
have ample drainage. It is a matter of moving 
again. 

Other Hhes there ought to be in this garden; 
but there's a pocket-book reason ! Some time the 
stately auratum, the nodding canadense, the fine 
lancifolium sorts will come into the borders, I 
hope, and to stay. I am the more anxious since I 
learn — again of Wilson — that they will thrive in my 
home-made leaf -mold. But I ought not to forget 
Lilium Henryi which has located, seemingly, and 



132 MY GROWING GARDEN 



which each year gives us a cluster of rich orange 
blooms with a notable green stripe. 

Not far from where the tiger Ulies are passing 
away are, or were, some plants that I found I could 
spare with pleasure, but which had no intention of 
leaving me, it seems. I planted the much-adver- 
tised and catalogue-lauded Anchusa italica, "Drop- 
more variety," in a prominent place in the bed 
intended to be confined primarily to blue flowers, 
and in which my delphiniums have been for several 
years giving me increasingly splendid bloom ser- 
vice. The anchusa, raised from seed, grew easily, 
and lustily, and pervadingly; and it bloomed, too. 
Instead of the "gentian-blue flowers that make it 
one of the most desirable of all perennials," accord- 
ing to the catalogue, there came fusty little pink 
and blue blobs on the end of a coarse, hairy stem, 
arising out of leaves that were not nearly so attrac- 
tive as those of a burdock ! And the thing crowded 
my lavender, insulted a perfectly good platycodon, 
and slopped over on some plants of the really 
pleasing stokesia. By September, one plant rotted 
at its heart, disgustingly, and I dug it out, as well 
as its fellows, concluding that would be about all 
from Mr. Dropmore Anchusa. But next year it 
came along just the same, each bit of root left 
in the ground evidently having the adventitious 



SOBER SUMMER 



133 



bud necessary to set up for itself. The next digging- 
out was as thorough as that required for aehillea, 
or bocconia, or physahs. I put the plants in a 
broad border where they seem to be in better 
place, and where they do fair service. 

It would be hard to find a garden plant more 
generally pleasing than the hardy perennial del- 
phinium. Rich ground — really rich; plenty of 
water; an annual fall covering of the crowns with 
sifted coal-ashes to ward off some bugs Mrs. Ely 
tells about; and the result is bloom from June until 
frost, and after frost. When I did not cut the 
bloom heads before seed formed, and indeed cut 
down the plant to the ground after the first burst 
of bloom, I had just ordinary blooming; but now 
that I keep cutting, there is continual flowering. 
And such flowering ! Great long heads of sky-blue, 
of ultramarine, of deeper blue, held up in a most 
attractive fashion over good foliage; what more 
could be asked? The first growth in the spring is 
very strong, and the plant must be kept tied to 
supports. Later, these may be withdrawn. 

In this same blue bed, later August sees the 
opening of Conoclinium ccelestinum, a perennial not 
well known. It is in Bailey's big Cyclopedia now 
classed as a eupatorium, in the boneset family of 
fine wild things; but it came to me as conoclinium. 



134 MY GROWING GARDEN 



and it is more blue for a longer time than any other 
plant I know. Its paint-brushy heads look like 
the familiar tender annual, the ageratum, and I 
have had them grow together to advantage. For 
all of six weeks the taller spikes of the conoclinium 
make intense the blue corner where they are. 

Another blue satisfaction is blooming along this 
month — the so-called "blue spirea," which is no 
more a spirea than it is a potato. Its first proper 
name of Caryopteris Mastacanthus has held it for a 
long time from the popularity it deserves. Perhaps 
the new Bailey name of C incana will help! In 
my growing garden it fits into a picture from the 
south porch, and provides for many weeks a blue 
mist of graceful details, about two-and-a-half feet 
high. Either fall sun or partial shade suits it. 

I have another catalogue humbug to report 
upon for August. Because of its mountain asso- 
ciation and its own beauty of color and pleasant 
odor, I have long liked the bergamot, or monarda 
— or horse-mint, as its unfair common name calls 
it. The fine fringy scarlet flowers come along in 
early summer, and at once remind me of the 
mountain climb to Eagles Mere, with the narrow- 
gauge railroad winding through great clumps of this 
brilliant bloomer. When I read in several cata- 
logues that the select variety "Cambridge Scarlet" 



SOBER SUMMER 



135 



had * 'flowers of a much more brilliant shade than 
the old variety," I was impressed, and bought. 
But the plants produced only blooms — and quan- 
tities of them, too — of a dirty dull crimson, not at 
all comparable with the plain M, didyma I was 
accustomed to. With a recommendation to the 
nurseryman to take treatment for color blindness 
I have "passed up" the Cambridge fraud. 

Of this same nurseryman I obtained two plants 
entirely pleasing. Spircea Filipendula fl-pL is the 
portentous name he gave the one that has rather 
dainty leaves, close to the ground, from amid which 
arise spikes about eighteen inches high of handsome 
white flowers, just now about over. It ought to be 
used as an edging plant, and it is called "drop- 
wort" sometimes as a common name, while Bailey's 
Cyclopedia now sets it forth as Filipendula hexa- 
petala, poor thing! The other good thing is 
Artemisia ladiflora, which grows some three feet 
high, and has also pleasing white flowers that stay 
good through weeks of hot weather. Unfortu- 
nately, in my state of misinformation, I planted 
these two together — but they don't fit ! 

It is much pleasanter to record satisfaction 
than failure, wherefore I now tell of how more 
than completely all catalogue representations have 
been realized concerning two shrubs, not so well 



136 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



known as they ought to be in this land of perva- 
ding "Golden Glow" and hydrangea ''p. g.," as the 
nurserymen abbreviate it. Ahelia grandifloray 
sometimes A, rwpestrisy is a graceful shrub with 
small, glossy leaves, almost evergreen in the South, 
and holding until long after the first frosts in this 
climate. If it had never a flower, it would be 
better than privet, for instance; but it does have 
flowers, and lovely they are. In refinement and 
form they resemble the traiHng arbutus, or May- 
flower; but unlike that shy and evanescent favorite, 
these persist for most of the time from June to late 
September. Their persistent dark red calyces are 
in themselves ornamental, without the dainty 
flower, and the whole combination is good. A 
fairly open and sunny place seems to best suit 
this abelia, which has not yet accumulated any 
"common" names. In some locations it may freeze 
to the ground in a very severe winter. This is 
nothing to worry about, for the young shoots will 
soon make a fine symmetrical bush, blooming 
freely the same season. 

The other shrub is called "summer hehotrope," 
"butterfly bush," and any other common name 
that happens to ocdu* to the owner or the nursery- 
man. Its real name is buddleia, which is bad 
enough as far as it goes, with the worst yet to 



SOBER SUMMER 



137 



come, for the specific name of the best of the 
varieties hardy in the middle states is Davidii 
var. magnifica. Get it all: Buddleia Davidii var. 
magnifica! What would have happened to the 
hlac if it had had to be named after Adam Buddie, 
an English botanist? It is mighty hard on a good 
plant to have so much mixed-up alphabet hung 
to it, and many such suffer under a blanket of 
obscurity for no worse cause. 

But this buddlea — I am omitting an unneces- 
sary vowel to try to make a name at least partly 
common — is a very excellent shrub. To be sure, 
zero weather will probably freeze it down to the 
ground or to the protection on the ground, and 
thus make sure of the pruning it needs; for its 
vigorous roots will provide shoots that will in a 
hurry make plenty of bush for beginning to bloom 
in late July or early August, and once begun, it 
seems to have no particular idea of stopping for a 
matter of five or six weeks. These blooms are in 
long panicles of rosy purple, enough hke a helio- 
trope to mark the resemblance, and they stand 
thickly upon the plant, which under generous 
treatment tends to become rather coarse. The 
butterfly designation is not inapt, because the 
butterflies seem exceedingly fond of the shrub, 
and are about it constantly. 



138 MY GROWING GARDEN 



Those who want to obtain this buddlea will 
find it offered by nurserymen as J8. variabilis 
magnifica. It likes the sun also, and planted close 
to tall shrubs, or at the edge of a border where it 
has room to spread, it is a fine thing in its season, 
in which there are none too many plants blooming. 
I am particular about room for it; a diameter of 
six feet the second year is not unusual. In fact, I 
planted one according to the size of its roots, and 
by midsummer it had, as I have previously noted, 
completely covered from sight two abelias, about 
three feet away ! 

The perennial gaillardias do much for the 
August flower show, for they keep up the blooming 
begun many weeks ago, and they are bright and 
showy in their brilliance of red and yellow. To 
freely cut the flowers, which last well in water, is 
to assure more and more of them. As a contrast 
in August, consider the sweet white *'day lily," 
called Funhia subcordata in the catalogues. Its 
fine clusters are most lasting in partial shade. 

Amongst annual flowers there are several that 
enjoy August. It is in the heat of this month 
that the lowly portulaca flourishes, for no matter 
what one may do, the ground must be hot before 
it will germinate, grow and bloom. It revels in the 
full sun, and as I used it one season at Breeze 



SOBER SUMMER 



139 



Hill, it made a riot of bright hues along both 
sides of a flagstone center walk. Indeed, it rioted 
too much, actually covering the stone footway 
so that one had to step on its flowers or go ofiE 
the walk. I had to cut it back vigorously, which 
seemed cruel while I was doing it. 

Most garden-makers know the old-fashioned 
zinnia, common-named "youth and old age" 
for some abstruse reason, but few know the newer 
giant form, and the old and overlooked Haageana 
varieties. The flower is really a giant among 
zinnias, and what is more, its size has not brought 
coarseness, but rather the contrary. After one 
trial, I sowed only the scarlet and the yellow 
giants, from which there was plenty of color varia- 
tion, with a slight predominance of a strong yellow 
and a gloriously bright scarlet, both with flowers 
emulating the dahlia in form, and maintained on 
long and stiff stems well above the abundant foli- 
age. For cutting and for bold garden effects, this 
zinnia is a fine thing, I find, and the flowers last 
very long in perfection. Contrary to a tradition 
handed down to me, it not only endures but revels 
in good ground and plenty of manure, and it can 
also use plenty of water. 

The other zinnia, Haageana by definite name, 
has quite small flowers, from the size of a quarter- 



140 MY GROWING GARDEN 



dollar up to about forty cents' worth. It is a sort 
of glorified coreopsis, but is not so weedy or so 
sticky as that annual. The colors seem to run into 
rich markings of orange, red, yellow, cream, and in 
between, and as the plants make fine little bushes 
and keep long in bloom, I'm voting for the zinnia 
with the name of the great Erfurt seedsman 
attached to it. 

These August evenings are made fragrant by the 
same sweet tobacco, or nicotiana, which began its 
odorous bloom in early July. There are really 
beautiful ten-weeks stocks to add their sweetness, 
also; and the long twilight is altogether lovely in 
the garden, if only I can persuade myself to put 
away the weeder or the shears, letting the garden- 
morrow look out for itself ! 

On an August return — ^the second trip home — 
looked after the summer pruning of the dwarf 
fruit trees. They have grown tremendously, and 
the peach trees this season gave us a fine crop, as 
also did the plums. I have learned from my Ger- 
man gardener-mentor, Mr. Rebe, to cut oflF at least 
half those long growths on the apples and pears, and 
as well to reduce the cherries and plums. He has 
taught me to select the limbs to leave, and to cut 
near the bud from which I want the next shoot to 
arise. The theory of summer pruning I know; it is 



03 i 



SOBER SUMMER 



141 



that the shock of heavy cutting is Kkely to cause 
the tree to set fruit buds the sooner. At first it is 
hard to reahze that next year's blossoms and 
potential fruits are being made this summer. 

As thus noted, my dwarf fruit trees have 
grown more than generously, so that I know there 
is plenty of plant-food in this seemingly sterile 
shade. Bearing has not as yet been full or normal 
on the apples and pears, because the trees are too 
busy forming themselves into symmetrical shape. 
This year I have pruned toward a more open cen- 
ter, to let the hght into the heart of the tree's 
bushy top. 

One season the peaches on a Carman tree came 
along as watery clingstones, rather than as the 
richly flavored freestones the same tree had pro- 
duced before. A wet season had much to do with 
the change, and it is possible that my neglect of 
summer spraying at various periods had some- 
thing to do with this trouble, and with the rot 
that destroyed many of the fruits. 

One of the pear trees flattened out against 
the espaher has had on it for two succeeding 
years some beautiful fruits. To show what has 
happened in four years, or more accurately just 
fifty months, I have made a photograph of the 
espalier in May of the year of its planting, and for 



142 MY GROWING GARDEN 



contrast have also introduced another of the whole 
orchard, to indicate how these dwarfs have found 
prosperity in this rough red shale. Some growth, 
isn't it? 

While I am writing of pictures, let me refer the 
reader to Plate XXI, so that I may ask whether 
the sight of orderly rows of growing vegetables is 
anything else than pleasant? Celery coming fast, 
beets and beans in abundance; carrots that are 
creamy before cooking, kohlrabi that is a surprise; 
experimental plantings of okra that I don't know 
how to use and of big Chinese radishes that I don't 
want to use; salsify for next winter's and chicory 
for next spring's salad; tomatoes that are all tender 
flesh and limas that are "all to the good;" — doesn't 
that sound as well as it looks — and tastes? 

And then the fruits ; there are some peaches yet, 
some plums, and the Green Mountain grapes have 
ripened, as usual, by the time of my second trip 
home. Indeed I am enjoying this growing garden, 
and some others with me ! 



CHAPTER IX— SEPTEMBER 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT— FINE THINGS TO SEE 

As a garden month, September carries a note 
/"^ of completeness. There is some relaxation 
now from the planning and the planting, 
and especially from the weeding and the spraying 
of earlier months. The results of hard work 
become apparent, and there are actually hours 
when I may sit at ease in the swing under the 
maple, contemplating the growth of the garden, 
and thinking more of next year's plans than of the 
next hour's work. 

The month is usually well started before Eagles 
Mere releases us, and so we find at Breeze Hill 
actual September, rather than the August exten- 
sion that one may expect in the earlier days. Of 
course the very first thing on returning to this 
regretfully left growing-garden home is a trip 
about, to see what is doing. Often this is a twilight 
trip, and it has been taken by moonlight to no 
disadvantage. Any light or no light, I could not 
expect to sleep without greeting the garden ! 

This year the arranged vegetable succession has 

(143) 



144 MY GROWING GARDEN 



been well maintained, and a rich abundance is 
found of good things to eat — things to eat the par- 
taking of which means no shedding of blood, no 
cessation of sentient life. At once, and without any- 
particular thought about it, we become mostly 
vegetarian in our diet. Why not, with such sweet 
corn as awaits us, the product of our own land? 
The sort we find ready now is Goldenrod, of 
most delicious flavor and notable sweetness, which 
bears more and larger ears than the earlier favorite 
Golden Bantam. We have it boiled, an hour 
from the growing stalks; or we have, in lieu of a 
roast, a great corn pie, or "pasty," that makes 
meats a mere unimportant recollection. 

Little beets, meltingly tender; yellow-podded 
snap beans, causing gratitude that they came on 
the table without the aid of a can-opener; spinach 
that has the flavor only possible in freshly plucked 
spinach; tomatoes that slice into small steaks of 
delicate flesh, with very little of seed cavity; 
carrots that hardly need to be creamed at all; and 
lima beans of the right size, fresh, and enough of 
them to satisfy a certain garden-maker who thinks 
he could about live on such beans and suitable 
bread — and all these available so as to give us our 
two vegetables for each dinner in a succession that 
prevents monotony. 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT 



145 



Those same tomatoes, and some of the Cos 
lettuce, come in comfortably for luncheon; while 
at breakfast one may always have radishes of some 
sort. There are growing this year big plants of 
the Japanese Sakurajima radish, with tremendous 
roots that slice into a most inoffensive table result, 
the pungency being wholly out of relation to the 
size. 

Our family has never connected very satis- 
factorily with Swiss chard, of which I usually grow 
some plants. If we had not such excellent beets 
and such delightful spinach, we might become 
enthusiastic about this vegetable which is a sort 
of combination of both. 

I find the garden well tilled, and thus with- 
standing the better the absence of rain, which 
showed in browned fields on my way home. Later, 
we shall have to water, unless nature takes that 
essential work off our hands. The result of several 
years of war on weeds is now seen in some relaxa- 
tion of their abundant germination. My effort 
has been to kill the weed before it has grown its 
second pair of leaves, not only in the interest of a 
clean place, but because I have seen what constant 
and persistent stirring of the ground does. I sus- 
pect that the necessity for weeding, in order that 
the first gardeners might restrict the use of the 
J 



146 MY GROWING GARDEN 



ground to certain plants they considered not weeds, 
was the beginning of culture. From Dr. Bailey's 
angle of view, the Colorado potato beetle, the 
San Jose scale, and all weeds, are blessings in dis- 
guise, because they force upon lazy humanity 
action which has other results than those imme- 
diately aimed at. To the average slouchy "hired- 
man," the demand for the "dust mulch" of proper 
cultivation seems unreasonable and absurd, as I 
know from more than one experience. 

At first I had no trouble in having plenty of 
inducement to cultivate, for in this old garden, 
neglected for more than a dozen years before I 
tackled it, there were vast reserves of weed seeds 
to keep germinating. After my ruthless slaughter 
had begun to make an impression on the shepherd's 
purse, the docks, the "pusly," the button-weed, 
and the other fifty-seven varieties of plants out of 
place, I had to contend with the contributions of 
the wind, which blew over nearby neglected pas- 
tures, thickly overgrown with wild carrot, many 
asters, goldenrods and the like. Now the opening 
of streets, the partial building up of the neighbor- 
hood, and most of all, two years of intensive cul- 
ture of the worst nearby weed patch as a boys' 
garden, has reduced the wind contributions materi- 
ally. It is no longer difficult to keep weeds out. 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT 



147 



especially since I have replaced certain of them 
with scarcely less persistent plants that I prefer — 
as I shall tell in a later chapter. 

September finds us enjoying fruits, as well as 
vegetables, in this growing garden. Two old Buf- 
fum pear trees, only survivals of a really great 
pear orchard that once vied with the Bellevue 
grapes, have taken on new life since they were 
cleaned, trimmed of dead wood, and sprayed. 
Each year they produce many bushels of fruit 
which we considered of little use until I remem- 
bered what I ought not to have forgotten — that 
most pears must be ripened off the tree to develop 
their proper flavor. Since then we prize the 
Buffum trees. Of the dwarf orchard, the peach 
trees have been bearing, as I have previously 
written, and the variety Stump the World is 
good in the earlier part of September, while a later 
sort — Krummell October — is not near ripening. 

The only apple trees to bear are the Bismarck, 
and they began the next year after planting. This 
year one tree, certainly not more than seven feet 
tall, had on it twenty-three apples, and large 
apples they grew to be. I am not at all proud of 
them, for the simple reason that they are more 
ornamental than useful. I am known as a con- 
firmed apple-eater, but the Bismarck is quite safe 



148 MY GROWING GARDEN 



from my appetite, being one of those Ben Davisy 
kind of fruit swindles that has only some fine 
red and yellow stripes on a thick and glossy skin 
to commend it, the inside averaging somewhat less 
toothsome than a turnip. These Bismarck trees 
are going to be ''top-worked" to varieties fit to 
eat, for I am not growing a garden on any false- 
alarm basis, and fruits that are only good-looking 
must move out. 

The grapes — oh, that's another story! Breeze 
Hill has been growing grapes, the records seem to 
show, since 1819, and most certainly since 1836. 
As a boy I knew the product of the "Bellevue 
Grapery," covering the hillsides south of the house 
in which I now write, and know it to be superior. 
Such Concords and Dela wares as the proud master 
of this vineyard used to market I have never seen 
elsewhere. When I came here six years ago the old 
vines, planted in 1858, were yet on the land, but in 
great disorder. No trimming for years; trellises 
broken down; the rows unfertilized and unculti- 
vated, and the poor old vines exposed to vandals 
of the type of some who came after we had settled 
here, and who resented being stopped from break- 
ing off great branches of the old lilacs, saying, 
"Why, we always come here for laylocks !" 

I was told that the vines were hopelessly 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT 



149 



afflicted with root-knot and other diseases, and at 
any rate the hillsides near were being cleared of 
them for real-estate development purposes. Most 
of those on my two acres were torn out, but I 
reserved two rows to experiment with. The first 
fall Old William got rid of most of these by way of 
a trash-fire that escaped him, and there were left 
but twelve of the venerable vines. These I worked 
over, trimming, spraying, cleaning, fertilizing, 
tying-up; and they are now the determining points 
in my two-row vineyard. All but two were Con- 
cord, and the one Delaware gave up the ghost the 
first winter. To complete the rows, I planted 
fine three-year-old vines from Fredonia, of such 
sorts as I wanted. They have flourished and fruited, 
so that this year I have enjoyed splendid Concord 
grapes from vines side by side, the one fifty-six years 
planted, and the other four years planted — and no 
one could tell the fruit apart ! On some of the vet- 
erans the rugged stems are three to four inches 
through above the ground; yet they do their 
appointed work quite as well as their youthful 
associates. 

As I have before mentioned, the best of the 
bunches on the grape-vines are given the pro- 
tection of a paper bag, applied in July, in which 
they come to a more perfect and unscarred matu- 



150 MY GROWING GARDEN 



rity. These grapes have been unexpectedly free 
from insect and fungous troubles, the worst of 
either being the visit, one year, of an agile and 
determined steel-blue beetle — determined to 
utterly destroy. He was immune to sprays, but 
when I made a submarine of him by shaking him 
into kerosene, he gave up. 

The chief fruit event of the month, however, is 
the strawberry event. ''Strawberries in Septem- 
ber — ^you're joking!" someone remarks. Not just 
exactly; those dehciously flavored, deep red ber- 
ries I had for breakfast the morning after the 
arrival from Eagles Mere were no joke ! Nor was 
the strawberry shortcake two days later a joke — 
it was a cuhnary poem! I have been hinting in 
earlier chapters at a strawberry story. Here it 
is, for the strawberries are now ripe, and I can 
pick and eat as the reader envies me — unless he 
calls and participates, or by happy chance has 
opportunity to pick and eat from his own "fall- 
bearing" plants. 

I had heard of fall-bearing strawberries, and 
several years ago had bought certain loudly 
commended foreign sorts — the 'Trench Four- 
Seasons," and others. The Frenchman did pro- 
duce some weedy little fruits, red enough, but of 
no importance as strawberries; and the other sorts 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT 



151 



just failed to connect at all. A strawberry-grower 
sent me samples of berries one autumn, but they 
tasted more of the cotton they were packed in 
than like the red fruit I knew. Early this spring 
I visited a strawberry-grower in Maryland, my 
friend Allen, who has actually millions of plants 
in his level fields. He showed me his Progressive 
variety, which, he asserted, was a real strawberry 
that would bear fruit in the fall, and was worth 
while. I know he knows, and I took his word 
against my skepti-cism. The one hundred try- 
out plants came and were set on April twenty- 
seventh, quite late for my location. They were 
well cared for, and as per instructions, the earlier 
blossoms — and some plants were in bloom by May 
twentieth! — were picked off. About the first of 
August, on a trip home, I found a new setting of 
blossoms; and these were not disturbed; but the 
plants were carefully mulched, and several times 
watered during the bitter drought that followed. 
The lovely, sweet and high-flavored fruit I am now 
enjoying is the result; and as blossoms and green 
fruits are crowding the ripening berries, I expect 
there will be strawberries for some weeks. 

The difference between these September Pro- 
gressives and the usual crop in June is that all of 
these are sweet and high-flavored, while some of 



152 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



the June berries are not. I am converted; and 
I'll hope to have more of these delightful fruits 
another year. Seemingly, as the ripening is suc- 
cessive, and not in one burst of a crop, it will take 
more plants to keep the family properly straw- 
berried in September and later; but that is easy 
enough ! 

Certainly the growing garden has given us 
good things to eat this month. It has, as well, 
many good things to see. The China asters are yet 
superb, especially the King sorts that reign over 
the border along the axis walk dividing the vege- 
table-garden. We cut, and cut, and cut again; 
always there are plenty of great flowers yet 
remaining. The "blister beetle" is now but a 
petroleum memory, for we Uterally "soaked him" 
in time. 

The hardy and actual asters are also fine. I 
find it necessary to be rather cruel to these, for 
they spread so rapidly that they tend to overrun 
other equally important flowers; wherefore I 
annually dig out and dispose of any that are in the 
way; as they are then weeds in the proper sense. 

The boltonias are akin to the hardy asters, and 
as likely to be too pervasive. But the pink sort in 
bloom is lovely, for it seems at a little distance to 
be covered with a rosy mist. Growing about as 



Plate XXVIII. "The 'white siuikeroot' . . . the absurd common 
name to Eupatorium ageratoidesJ^ (See page 153.) 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT 



153 



high is the *Vhite snakeroot," to give the absurd 
common name to Eupatorium ageratoides. The 
latter proper name is descriptive, for it is an 
ageratum-Hke "boneset" of most pleasing char- 
acter, and here remains in bloom for all of three 
weeks in the full sun. I brought the plants from 
the wild, and Mr. Manning was afraid they would 
not endure the soil and the sunshine. They have 
''rejoiced and been glad" for both. 

Along the axis or living-room border — did I 
mention that Mr. Manning had me center the 
garden on the house? — there is now blooming a 
lowly blue beauty, Plumbago Larpentoe as it used to 
be called, Ceratostigma plumhaginoides as it is now 
abusively designated in Bailey's Standard Cyclo- 
pedia, and leadwort as sometimes known. Poor 
little creeping bit of blue elegance — how can it 
get loved under such a bunch of riotous Latin 
profanity! I can make it a go at plumbago, and 
it reproduces now in this shady place the hue of 
the scilla of spring. Near it grows, and tends to 
overgrow everything, the pink-flowered Sedum 
spedabile, which is handsome and happy here 
where the sun visits scantily. 

The splendid delphiniums keep right on during 
the month in their blue prominence, and my pet 
weedy tobacco annual, the nicotiana, is as sweet 



154 MY GROWING GARDEN 



and easy as ever. That dry place near the maple 
tree is ablaze with Scarlet Dragon salvia, and the 
conoclinium continues its mist of blue. In another 
of the garden beds — and I wish they were all 
borders ! — ^the pleasing salpiglossis holds up its odd 
flowers in much richness. Some lantanas nearby 
are now a mass of orange and yellow flowers, and 
the source of a strong and not disagreeable odor. 
Another catalogue disappointment is now in bloom 
in Helenium autumnale rubrum. Note that last 
Latin word, which means red, and which is why I 
bought the plants. With a magnifying glass, at 
times, it is possible to note a bit of scarlet in the 
mass of "sneeze wort" blooms now open, but 
generally they are just plain orange, and nothing 
more. I was almost enough provoked at the fraud 
to "see red," but that wouldn't improve the hue 
of the flowers. 

The snapdragons are now in their glory, and I 
think they'll keep it up until after the first frosts, 
if we pick them often enough. Clear white, and a 
lovely shade of pink, are my favorites, though some 
deep scarlet blooms are pretty fine. I'm sticking 
to the dwarf or Tom Thumb and intermediate 
classes, as the tall forms tend to blow over in the 
winds that sweep this garden. 

Seedsmen are generally careful, but I've been 



GOOD THINGS TO EAT 



155 



wondering just what particular reason the guilty 
one is going to give me to account for the fact 
that most of the seed he sold me to plant as mixed 
Phlox Drummondii has produced plain pink 
petunias? The petunias are not bad, but I wanted 
phlox, and there are some among the petunias, 
though not in predominance. 

Speaking of the petunia, what a satisfactory 
annual it is ! When the little seedlings first appear, 
so tiny and so weak, it is hard to believe that in 
but a few weeks we shall be enjoying a veritable 
cloud of bloom, if it happens to be a one-color 
planting hke this corner of lovely Snowstorm. 
Equally lovely are the bloom-covered plants of a 
dwarf petunia from Sutton, which keeps within six 
inches of the ground, blooming continually in pink- 
and-white clouds. Yet another petunia from the 
Enghsh seedsman is called violet on the seed- 
packet, but its large and numerous flowers are the 
exact purple shade of the much-desired Clematis 
Jackmanii. From the same very careful Sutton I 
have had and tried to succeed with nemesia, an 
EngUsh favorite which quite evidently does not 
find pleasure in the Breeze Hill conditions, for it 
barely exists. 

Other annuals add to the mature beauty of the 
September garden. The only shrubs yet blooming 



156 MY GROWING GARDEN 



are the abelia and the buddlea, and my one 
unprized plant of Hydrangea paniculata grandi- 
flora. Another year the fine H, paniculata, not 
grandiflora, will be strong enough to bloom, and 
then I shall have a favorite close by, in its interest- 
ing and not fussy flowers. 

This month the giant zinnias are really gor- 
geous, impressive, fine ! The crescent border which 
in spring showed in narcissi against the great 
evergreens now glows with their stately flowers in 
clear and bright reds and yellows. These blooms 
are not coarse, either in form or in color, and when 
cut for house decoration they supply a certain 
arrangement-possibihty pecuHar to themselves and 
entirely desirable. 

The Haageana zinnias, to which I have pre- 
viously referred in terms of commendation, show 
clearly on another curve, where they are bloom- 
ing away as if they intended never to stop. 

Yes, we've had, and have, plenty of good things 
to eat from the garden-home, and all the time there 
is even more of a feast for the eye. God is very 
good to the gardener ! 



Plate XXIX, "The giant zinnias are really gorgeous. . . . The 
crescent border . . . glows with their stately flowers." 
(See page 156.) 



CHAPTER X— OCTOBER 



THE EAKLY FALL GLORY 

IF SEPTEMBER shows as its distinguishing 
feature garden maturity, October may be 
said, in this chmate at least, to put a plus mark 
on the same feature. All the things you have been 
doing come to some result by October, and the 
hint of the coming winter rest-time for the vege- 
table kingdom only hastens the rush to grow, it 
seems. When I look back over the records of past 
Octobers, and then look around me at the record, 
on and in the ground, of this October, I am con- 
strained to call it a very full month, and a very 
pleasing one. 

The lawns have recovered from the paralysis 
of summer's heat, so deadening to the grass on 
this yet thin soil at Breeze Hill, and the green is 
rich and deep. Cool nights have caused the roses 
to rejoice, and not only all the steady bloomers 
like Teplitz (that's my name for Gruss an Teplitz, 
a scandalous load for a great little rose!), Orleans 
and Baby Rambler are exerting themselves, but 
Killarney and the hybrid teas are at work making 

(157) 



158 MY GROWING GARDEN 



big buds, and the great white queen, Druschki (my 
convenient contraction for Frau Karl Druschki), is 
showing superb flowers. Even the General Jacq. 
gives us once in a while a crimson surprise. 

Shrubs that did their blooming early have put 
in the summer making growth for next year, and 
now they show it in stem and foliage. I ought to 
trim oflf the greened heads of the so-called "Snow- 
ball" hydrangea, but I rather like to see them, and 
I altogether like the great oak-leaves of Hydrangea 
quercifolia, a shrub not yet big enough to bloom 
much, but most distinct in its leafage. I have 
associated all the rarer hydrangeas in one vicinity, 
each as points in one of the vista-pictures I am 
working for and gradually seeing bloom and leaf 
into Ufe. As this month witnesses the beginning of 
the sometimes slow and always interesting change 
of foliage colors that precedes the clearing of bough 
and twig for winter's blasts, I have opportunity 
to see how the autumn colors fit the picture. 

It is unfortunate that more consideration is not 
given to the effects that may be obtained by plant- 
ing trees and shrubs with thought for their color 
values the whole year round. That it is done in 
some cases is usually because one of the greater 
workers with nature's paints — Olmsted, Manning 
or some other of the few that know and use their 



THE EARLY FALL GLORY 159 



knowledge — has had opportunity to propose the 
planting. Or mayhap the planter has been so 
fortunate as to have visited the Arnold Arboretum 
of Harvard University, or to have received its 
bulletins, so as to observe or read how the great 
world-master of shrubs and trees, Professor Sar- 
gent, uses autumn leaf, bare twig color and endur- 
ing bright fruits to add interest at the season mis- 
called melancholy. The department-store type of 
home-planting takes no account of such matters; 
nor does the average nurseryman, I am sorry to 
say, who is all too likely to sell the shrubs and 
trees that grow most easily and look most impres- 
sively large as young plants. It is as users of 
plants and trees for the making of living pic- 
tures in the open come to know what they can 
have, and what may be accomplished at various 
times of the year, that the proper shrubs will be 
grown, and desirable individuality will be im- 
pressed upon gardens. I have seen home-grounds 
done sadly often upon the same general architec- 
tural concept as that which has governed the 
building in some cities of block on block, or row on 
row, of identical houses. Even the individual bad 
taste of using a Colorado blue spruce away from 
absorbing and harmonizing greens is better than 
the dread monotony of hydrangea "p. g.," golden 



160 MY GROWING GARDEN 



glow, Sfircea Van Houttei and a scant half-dozen 
similar excellent but over-used shrubs. 

What I am preaching now is planting for an 
effect to suit the particular case at any time of 
year, that effect to be what the planter himseK — 
or usually herself — individually believes to be the 
best. And I preach again that this effect shall not 
be a sheer imitation, sought for because seen and 
liked somewhere else under totally different con- 
ditions. I have in mind an example, where the 
garden man — or woman, I think — ^had traveled 
considerably, and seen much, but had not sorted 
up with any particular care the impressions 
received. One thing seen, admired and desired was 
a rose-covered pergola; wherefore a brick pergola 
was promptly built in the center of a flat open 
space, at some distance from the pretentious 
house and between two streets. It simply rose 
out of the ground, leading nowhere, connecting 
with nothing, and, even after the roses grew, 
seeming purposeless. True, chairs were placed in 
the center of the affair, but I never saw the time 
when my friends had the "nerve" to sit in those 
chairs! It would have been like going into a 
"grand-stand" for a pageant, minus the pageant. 
The whole effect was summarized by an acute 
friend, who said, "Isn't it painful?" 



Plate XXX. "The stately . . . Japanese anemones are at their 
best." (See page 161.) 



THE EARLY FALL GLORY 161 



But I am wandering far from home, and the 
weather is too fine to stay away from my yet 
growing garden, where I am sincerely trying, at 
least, to work out pictures with plants right here, 
and without thought of slavish imitation. 

October surely provides me with some plant- 
paints peculiar to the season. The stately, yet 
lovely and dainty Japanese anemones are at their 
best for full three weeks, and it is a very good best. 
In the pink bed a great mass of Queen Charlotte 
shows satiny flowers of a beautiful rose tint, and 
the pure white Whirlwind is a drawing display 
against the old arborvitae hedge. Some plants in a 
shady border hold back later, and one clump along 
the axis walk combines its whiteness with the 
lovely blue monkshood, Aconitum Fischeri var. 
Wilsonii. It is a good combination. 

Those same delphiniums mentioned so fre- 
quently are yet a leading garden feature, for the 
cutting away of the blooms without permitting 
seed to be formed has caused them, assisted by a 
liberal manure mulch and much water, to keep 
right on blooming. Instead of becoming ragged by 
reason of long bloom and cool nights, the scarlet 
sage is finer than ever. In fact, about everything 
that was blooming in September has concluded to 
be ''continued in our next," and is with us yet. On 

K 



162 MY GROWING GARDEN 



the second Sunday of the month I noted thirty- 
four distinct flower species in good bloom, and 
seemingly intending to keep on awhile. 

The chrysanthemums are an October featiu'e. I 
have tried to get large-flowering hardy 'mums, and 
I succeed in growing them easily enough, only they 
are not hardy, and are gone by spring. This 
October there are blooming some very lovely 
flowers among the chrysanthemums, and my hope 
for over-winter living is strong. Certain seedlings 
with surprisingly good flowers are coming into 
bloom. An exquisite Hght pink, Normandie, 
has lasted three weeks in beauty; LiUian Doty, 
a deeper pink, is also lasting; and there are yellows, 
reds, and a persistent and lovely informal white — 
Queen of the Whites — that I really want to 
carry over and have more of. But if they fail? 
Well, I've certainly had my money's worth now, 
and I can plant again without feeling cheated. 

Part of my desire to have this class of chrysan- 
themums "hve over" comes, I think, from two 
memories. One is of the old home of my boyhood, 
about which grew quantities of white, pink, red, 
yellow and brown "frost flowers," as we called 
them, that just came each fall, and were never 
renewed. Then I remember seeing, not once, but 
often, masses of much larger 'mums in country 



THE EARLY FALL GLORY 163 



farm gardens, on the roads out from the city; and 
of thinking that these were better than the florist's 
larger flowers. 

Cosmos is another October joy. In this garden 
cosmos, Hke pansies, seems to naturalize by seK- 
seeding, so that there will be hundreds of seedlings 
of both next year. Each year I sow afresh, how- 
ever, and this year I am enjoying a combination 
suggested in one of the garden papers — that of 
asparagus and cosmos. I transplanted the cosmos 
into the asparagus border, with the result that 
the fine foliage but sturdy stems of the juicy spring 
vegetable have protected the cosmos while young, 
and the two, grown up, mingle into a lovely riot 
of flower and foliage. Heretofore the staking of the 
cosmos has been necessary, but this year it has not 
been required. 

Pansies, as I have written, are practically 
naturalized now in this garden, and must some- 
times even be treated as weeds, though that is 
cruel hard weeding. Each year I sow and grow 
good "strains" of pansy, and they do exceedingly 
prosper ! This season there has been a continuous 
performance for more than five months, the show 
alternating sometimes and sometimes being simul- 
taneous between two beds, one planted with pan- 
sies grown from seed obtained in Portland, Oregon, 



164 MY GROWING GARDEN 



and the other disporting the best flowers of a 
strain grown by a speciahst in Massachusetts. 
Honors are about even between them, though the 
Massachusetts bed is hkely to go into the winter 
all blooming and happy, because it was cut down 
once in summer, and very carefully fertilized then 
with that powerful tonic, hen manure. Let me say 
to any gardener growing pansies, that prosperity 
in bloom and much good manure go together. 
When there has been enough manure applied in 
the ground, just put in, and on, as much again, 
and take notice of the result. 

Few garden makers realize, I think, that the 
ordinary pansy of our pleasure, Viola tricolor, is 
actually a perennial, and a nearly hardy perennial 
at that. In England it is grown from cuttings and 
kept alive from year to year. In the Breeze Hill 
garden the survivals are usually of self -seedlings, 
though one year it happened that a small group of 
very good pansies Vv^as heavily fertilized late in 
summer, and all the "leggy" stems cut off. A fine 
fresh growth with prompt flowers resulted. By 
accident, rather than by intention, this group of 
pansies was given a protection of coarse refuse 
and manure. In the very early spring the pansies 
again began business, and the individual flowers 
the second season were fully equal to the best of 



THE EARLY FALL GLORY 165 



the first season's bloom. It is thus evident that 
keeping your favorite pansies ahve and blooming 
is only a matter of a little attention. Most of us 
will, I presume, continue to treat the pansy as an 
annua-1, because that is the easier way — and we 
American gardeners are strong on easy ways! 

I aim to get on as familiar terms with the 
so-called Scotch, or tufted pansies, that are most 
lovely, shade-enduring, and also continuous-flow- 
ering, though not so large. Again I have old- 
home memories of bright little " Johnny- jump- 
ups," appearing each year in the garden, and show- 
ing their impish monkey-faces almost underfoot. 
I wish I might locate a few ! I have, actually car- 
ried along in life endured in the various city back- 
yards in the thirty years since I saw the last of my 
mother's garden, two peonies and some lilies-of- 
the-valley, both coming from a bed that must have 
been at least thirty years old then. Perhaps it is 
fooUsh sentiment to cherish these plants for their 
origin; but I am not ashamed. 

Not far from the beds of transcontinental 
pansies there grows now a little mass of nigella, or 
"love-in-a-mist," a charming annual, altogether 
pleasing. Its foliage is prettily cut, and its abun- 
dant blue flowers do seem to be mist-surrounded 
by the foHage, while the seed-heads that follow are 



166 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



entirely decorative. The scabiosa, or ''mourning 
bride," is another of the really good annuals I have 
enjoyed this year, as it nods its graceful stems in 
the breeze, its odd but richly colored round blooms 
at the tips. For cutting, no annual is better; the 
flowers last long in the house. Arctotis grandis, 
a newer annual, has given us many weeks of good 
daisy-hke flowers, and the splendid annual gail- 
lardias seem not to know how to be out of bloom 
at any time. But of all the annuals — and these 
I am growing seem perennial — the wallflowers 
are the most enduring and persistent. Blooming 
now, and exceedingly sweet they are, in their 
smoky browns and crimsons and dull yellows ; and 
they will probably be blooming under the snow at 
Christmas, if there is snow then. The wallflower 
is a sweetly scented and somewhat inconspicuous 
member of the garden family with which I am 
inclined to a much closer acquaintance. 

All the garden standards are at their best in 
October, as I have written. Particularly does the 
lowly verbena enjoy the cool nights. Where it 
grows, there were planted after July first some 
gladioH bulbs, with the result that now the 
stately spikes of scarlet "War" glow from a ver- 
bena carpet, while white 'Teace" and lovely 
"America" rise in company. I know that a cer- 



THE EARLY. FALL GLORY 



167 



tain strict ideal forbids such a use of either 
verbenas or pansies; yet the eflFect seems here 
entirely pleasing and in good taste. 

A wonderful color contrast is available now in 
the cut blooms of the briUiantly blue Salvia patens 
grouped with the equally brilhantly orange flowers 
of the calendula or pot-marigold. Both are bloom- 
ing more abundantly than in the warmer days, and 
it also seems as if the nearby petunias, dianthus 
and snapdragons had received some especial 
encouragement from the weather — or is it from 
the heavy mulch of well-rotted manure that covers 
the ground about them, and through which soaks 
the water plentifully apphed in consequence of 
rainless weeks ? 

DahHas are perplexing in their behavior at 
Breeze HjU. At first it seemed as if this must be 
their long-lost home, so \agorously did they grow, 
and so abundantly did they flower; but for several 
years they have been slow to start, and reluctant 
to bloom. This year the progress was not satis- 
factory until early in this October, when an 
awakening seemed to happen, so that now we have 
superb flowers, and plenty of them. Of course they 
will be at their best about the time of the first frost, 
which will nip them more easily than it will any- 
thing else ! Even the nearby and really gorgeous 



168 MY GROWING GARDEN 



cannas will endure a little frost, but not so Madame 
Dahlia. These cannas, by the way, are of the sorts 
produced by Antoine Wintzer, as I have previously 
written, and are most attractive, brilliant and satis- 
factory. Each year I am likely to have a short 
visit with this genial Alsatian, and then to hear 
him tell of his aims in the further perfection of 
specialty. He grows roses for a living, but I some- 
times think he lives to grow cannas! 

Of fruit in this young garden, we have yet the 
grapes in bags, the bunches in the open having been 
long ago eaten either by bipeds, hit by the one 
mean hail-storm of the season, or punctured for the 
sweet juice by myriads of bees. The paper pro- 
tection covers from all these troubles, and it is a 
fruit event to open a bag on a cool morning, taking 
from it the chilled, ripe grapes in perfect condition. 
Those strawberries I wrote about in September are 
keeping right on with their blooming and bearing, 
so that we are renewing our June days with them. 
Hurrah for the Progressive ! Then that late peach, 
Krummell, has been giving us great golden globes 
of rich yellow JSesh all through two weeks, after 
other peaches are only a memory. I can hurrah 
some for Herr Krummell, too ! 

In the earlier garden years we began to get 
vegetable-poor in early October. Not so this year; 



Plate XXXI. ''Celery just humping itself these cool nights." 
(See page 169.) 



THE EARLY FALL GLORY 169 



there is an increasing abundance of the best, and 
we hardly keep up, these days, more than a bowing 
acquaintance with the butcher. Three sorts of 
sweet corn, all really sweet; lima beans growing 
and swelling so fast that we can't possibly eat up 
to them; a treat of Nott's Excelsior peas, late 
planted; tomatoes, carrots, beets, peppers, spinach, 
snap beans, turnips if we want them (we don't!), 
lettuce of two sorts, parsley all the time, celery 
just humping itself these cool nights to get ready 
for use — ^what more could properly be asked of a 
growing garden? 

There is more; we have made the acquaintance 
of kohlrabi this year, and it is an agreeable 
acquaintance. I grew some of the White Vienna 
sort, just to have it. The blue-green foliage, and 
the nice Httle turnipy bulbs above ground were 
first-rate to look at. A visit from my gardener 
friend Rebe indicated a way to become more 
intimate with this little-grown cousin of the cab- 
bage and the cauliflower. Several of the pretty 
bulbs were trimmed, pared, sliced, soaked in salt- 
water, boiled in the same with several pourings-o£F, 
and a cream dressing added. Result, a deUcious 
dish, attaining immediate popularity. The taste .f* 
A little like cabbage, more like cauliflower, but 
better than either, and wholly free from coarse- 



170 MY GROWING GARDEN 



ness, either of flavor or texture. We shall have suc- 
cessions of kohlrabi hereafter, for it may be had 
all seasons, it appears. 

Here was a case in which "we all" didn't know 
how to use to advantage a good food product; and 
most Americans do not know at all about this, or 
about many other excellent vegetables. Moreover, 
when we do know how to use the garden bounty, it 
is usually only in one or two ways, and seldom 
does even so good a housewife as the one who 
permits me to sit daily at her better-than-any- 
hotel table know how to successfully ^preserve 
vegetables that cannot be eaten fresh. It has been 
stated that more than forty per cent of the vege- 
tables grown in gardens go to waste, and I think 
the percentage is even higher here; yet we come 
to long in the winter for the succulent beans, the 
luscious corn, the deliciously sweet peas, that were 
superabundant in the growing time. My good wife 
has tried, and tried; and though she is surely a 
proficient at preserving and jellying and "butter- 
ing" fruits, and her pantry shelves are richly 
stocked, she has not found the way to carry into 
the winter the finer vegetables. Once there was 
a six-hour boiling of snap beans. They "kept," 
sure enough; but wrapping-paper to eat in any 
other guise would have been just as undesirable! 



THE EARLY FALL GLORY 171 



I think the great department of bugs and diseases 
and funguses and fruit troubles at Washington 
might come sometime to helping the conservation 
of vegetables, now that conservation is the 
fashion !* 

While the weather this October has been fine, in 
its general comfort, there has been practically no 
rain, and the hose has been kept going in the 
garden much of the time. The notable Camp- 
bell sprayer enables me to cause a gentle rain to 
fall over or upon a fifty-foot circle, without "pack- 
ing" the ground to any serious extent, while on 
the grass walks the no less notable Skinner "lawn 
mist" tool distributes a yet gentler rain with even 
efficiency over a rectangle of eight by twelve feet. 

Off in a half -shaded spot back of the fruit espa- 
her I have located the bed to which were trans- 
planted the perennials that we will need next spring 
to renew and to extend our plantings. They were 
sown in July and August, and coddled a Httle with 
shade and water in the coldframes. Now they 
are growing lustily in the open, to winter over com- 
fortably, I hope. Hollyhocks, columbines, arabis, 

*After these words are written, I find there is vegetable conservation 
proposed in Farmers' Bulletin No. 359, of the Department of Agriculture, 
entitled "Canning Vegetables in the Home." The basis of safe preservation 
of vegetables is, I read therein, in sterilization by heating at successive 
times, as on three following days, rather than by one prolonged cooking. 
I hope other garden-makers will send for that bulletin. 



172 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



sweet Williams by separate colors, delphiniums, 
Iceland poppies, and so on — ^the fine old standby 
sorts; plenty to plant, and more to give away. 
Each year I note that we ought to plant them 
earUer; and I trust next June will see us sowing 
for the fall carry-over — ^though anyone who is 
operating a personally-conducted garden is likely 
to discover that sufficient unto June are the joys 
thereof, without laying up much treasure in the 
way of provision for another year. 

These lovely October days, with a morning 
tang in the air followed by mid-day mildness, give 
us another use of the Breeze Hill garden. My good 
wife's Sunday school girls, mostly from gardenless 
homes, romp over the lawns, delight in the flowers, 
feast on the fruits, and pay for all of it by giving 
me the joy of their joy, plus an opportunity to 
use my camera on the picture they make when 
grouped for an instant's quiet. 

At the last of the month, after a sharp frost 
that made us chase for protecting burlaps and 
boards, the autumn color is the feature. But that 
is properly a November story; sufficient, full and 
fine are the days of October! 



CHAPTER XI— IN BETWEEN 



CHOOSING YOUR OWN WEEDS 
O one in his senses would ever choose any 



weed," some one says. That depends, is 



the answer; it depends on what is a weed, 
in the first place, and on what kind of a weed it is, 
once a plant has been so stigmatized. The sim- 
plest definition of the word weed is "a plant out of 
place," and the unhuman scientist may be per- 
fectly satisfied with that disposition of the lovely 
mountain laurel or the aristocratic rhododen- 
dron, when great specimens of either stand in the 
way of a road or a building. 

He would agree with a really delightful friend 
of mine whose knowledge of plants is limited to 
three: "fern," "grass" and hydrangea. Of the 
three, hydrangea (meaning the hydrangea "p. g." I 
have frequently mentioned) is in his view the most 
important and valuable, and "grass" of next 
desirability, "fern" being endurable under certain 
conditions in which "grass" cannot be made to 
grow. All else that grows, of less stature than 
trees, is either "weeds" or "brush," and to be as 




(ITS) 



174 MY GROWING GARDEN 



rapidly as possible substituted by grass or 
hydrangea. Now my friend's not extended knowl- 
edge of the vegetable kingdom would only have 
amused me, had he not been for many years a 
man of authority about a summer-home mountain- 
top, that mountain-top being in the heart of a bit 
of primeval forest, with its flower-set * 'floor" and 
its native-shrub undergrowth. Acting on his 
ideals, he had destroyed as weeds quantities of 
the dainty pink moccasin-flower orchid, great 
colonies of the sweet maianthemum, with New 
England asters, clintonia, trilliums and the Hke, 
as nature had planted them in more centuries of 
time that he is years old; and he had "brushed 
out" of the forest laurels and red-berried elders, 
and superbly symmetrical old specimens of the 
withe-rod viburnum, the high-bush huckleberry, 
and other plant-citizens belonging in this favored 
place. And then he sowed grass seed and planted 
hydrangeas, so that this nave of God's forest 
temple might look hke his Pennsylvania front 
yard! The grass, finding little encouragement in 
the mountain mold, was hard to establish, and 
even yet the lovely partridge-berry and certain 
of the buttercup family break through and put 
the sickly grass-roots out of business. But the 
hydrangea has grown vociferously, rampantly. 



CHOOSING YOUR OWN WEEDS 175 



inexcusably, until its plants and their plumes 
dominate the place for months. 

Here, it may be noted, the "plant out of place" 
definition is susceptible of more than one appli- 
cation. To my friend, grass is the only plant good; 
to me, his introductions are most certainly weeds 
in this garden of God's planting. 

I think I may construct my own definition of a 
weed as, in the first place, a plant of persistent 
and spreading growth that is not sufficiently 
beautiful in foKage or flower to commend it for 
its own sake; or as a plant attractive in itseK that 
tends to possess the land to the exclusion of all 
else. Thus the ox-eyed daisy is unquestionably a 
weed, even though it is beautiful, because it 
spreads rapidly and persistently, so that whole 
fields on the careless farm wave with its flowers, 
and justify the gibe of Dr. Bailey of Cornell, who 
said to me, when once we passed such a display 
of neglect, "That man is not a farmer; he's a 
florist!" This same Dr. Bailey's definition of a 
weed as "a plant not wanted" is simple enough, 
and true. 

Of the first class of weeds are those I found per- 
vading the land when we came to Breeze Hill. On 
the preliminary trip to "look out" the place, the 
ladies of the family accumulated on their clothing 



176 MY GROWING GARDEN 



ropes of "stick-tights" and my trousers were set 
high with ''Spanish needles." The poke-weed 
leaves had not yet been frost-cut, and great bur- 
docks rosetted what had been the lawn. Shep- 
herd's-purse, dandelion, wild carrot, plantain, but- 
ton-weed, mustard, purslane — ^these and their 
natural associates were playing the old game of 
the survival of the fittest all about. Catnip was 
everywhere, and of poison ivy there was more than 
enough to fill an order my old nursery -friend Moon 
once told me he had received from abroad for 
"1,000 Rhus toxicodendron,^' 

In the early spring the war began, and it lasted 
over several succeeding springs before I could 
come to feel that I was acceptable in the evolu- 
tionary sense, and was surviving over the weeds 
because I was fittest to survive. There were many 
separate engagements, for in a curious fashion, 
one weed at a time would seem to come to the 
front and especially dominate all the ground. Ruth- 
less and repeated uprooting, mean and hazardous 
to do, rapidly disposed of the poison ivy.* The 
poke-weed, which has a deep, fleshy, crooked white 

*Just a word as to ivy poisoning, to those susceptible — as I am not. 
Whatever be the treatment adopted, let it be preceded by a hard scrub- 
bing of the affected places with hot water and laundry soap, applied with a 
stiflit brush. This, if thoroughly done, tends to diminish the eruption and 
especially to prevent the re-infection which otherwise does the most damage. 



CHOOSING YOUR OWN WEEDS 177 



root and a top that comes ofT when you don't 
want it to as easily as one of those patent inter- 
changeable umbrella handles, was the next con- 
testant, and Mr. Phytolacca put up a hard fight 
before he assumed a relation of only occasional 
presence. Every bit of a root seemed to make a 
new plant, and particularly in shady corners did 
these flourish and flaunt and flower and seed. 

I had all the broad-leaved docks uprooted that 
first season, I thought. It was but a vain thought, 
however, for there were more of them next season, 
and the next. Ever try to dig a good husky dock. 
Gentle Reader? Then you know how easily and 
comfortably its soft top comes away, leaving a 
root only encouraged to reach deeper by temporary 
relief from foliage ! Along the east end of the long 
arborvitse hedge there was so much of both the 
pervading docks that I thought they would be 
exterminating each other, because of lack of food. 
I had again forgotten that there was plenty of 
room toward the center of the earth, and that the 
Rumex family is not particular as to soil quality, 
or shade, or sun, or moisture. Any old corner 
will do as well as the center of the lawn, and there 
will be dock prosperity in both. 

The next battle was with "shepherd's-purse," a 
rather neat-looking affair resembling sweet alyssum 

L 



178 MY GROWING GARDEN 



gone wrong. It is an annual with the well-devel- 
oped habits of the really criminal weed class; that 
is, like dandelion, orange hawkweed (thank heaven, 
I have none of that terror!), and the plantains, it 
will accommodate itself to any condition, and 
bloom under the lawn-mower or a foot high, accord- 
ing to opportunity. And how it seeds and spreads ! 
The west garden plot, the soil of which I had to 
make from raw, rough shale, was its favorite 
growing spot, and it got in its fine work when I 
had that in winter vetch over a season, for obtain- 
ing humus and nitrogen. The shepherd's-purse 
(the name is absurd !) came up through the vetch, 
and the only thing to do was to pull, pull, pull ! One 
merit the weed does have; its top is well fastened 
to the long tap-root by which it prospers in any 
drought, and if it is grasped by this and twisted a 
bit, you can really get it out in moist weather. I 
developed a continuous back-ache pulling shep- 
herd's-purse on wet days; but at last that weed 
ceased to be of any particular importance. 

Then came the button-weed, that round-leaved 
perennial which grows nice little "cheeses" about 
one-sixth inch across — ^which same cheeses I 
found palatable when I had a boy's omnivorous 
and continuous appetite. We are told that this 
mallow harbors the fungus that interferes with the 



CHOOSING YOUR OWN WEEDS 179 



prosperity of hollyhocks, wherefore it is placed in 
the index eradicatorius. It has the same merit 
as the capsella, or shepherd's-purse; it doesn't 
easily lose its head. But its tap-root is likely to 
be forked, and outrageously long. And it will 
blossom and fruit and raise a numerous and ener- 
getic family in two inches above the ground; while 
I have found stems two feet long in a pasture. It 
nearly had legs ! 

Of wild carrot and chicory and golden-rod I 
have had but few, even though my surroundings 
are heavy with them. For each I have admiration 
as a flower, and I promise myself a border or a row 
or two of them specifically planted in good ground, 
and kept within the assigned space. If any white 
flower surpasses the wild carrot in dainty grace and 
decorative value, I have not seen it. 

The lawn weeds I shall not write of until I take 
up pen to confess my grass sins, which are many, 
and to state my greensward hopes, which are only 
moderately high. 

I have written above of the weeds I have chosen 
to destroy. There are some plants that I want to 
have take the place of the really weedy weeds; for 
I have made the not very original discovery that 
nature's disposition to get the ground covered is 
worth working with, and not against. I'm willing 



180 MY GROWING GARDEN 



to have the great dame do the covering, but I 
desire to nominate the coverers. 

For instance, and as I have written elsewhere, I 
cannot yet get the slopes of Lovers' Lane ready for 
the guests from the wild they are designed for. 
Therefore I have encouraged the common blue 
violet to take possession, and the said violet has 
filled the order promptly. As I get other things, 
some of the big violet clumps will simply pass on 
to the muck-pile. In another location, I found the 
English sweet white violet hardy and rampant, 
and to it has been assigned important duties in 
consequence. It is a pretty "swell" weed, if you 
please ! 

About Breeze Hill there are many shady corners, 
and some of them also are dry. Several years ago 
at Eagles Mere I found the beautiful wild colum- 
bine growing in shade, and in the dryness of a rock 
crevice with very little soil. That gave me an idea, 
and I collected a few plants, which have made gay 
for several May weeks the southeast approach to 
Lovers' Lane. Carefully saving the abundant seed- 
age, I sowed it favorably, and obtained at least a 
thousand fine little plants. These have been trans- 
planted into the difficult places, the sunless, mois- 
tureless spots and corners; and certain slopes have 
also been set with the columbines. This first season 



CHOOSING YOUR OWN WEEDS 181 



the growth is good, and the bloom beautiful; but it 
is only a mere hint of what is to follow as these 
plants gain strength. The fine, fern-like foliage 
lasts in complete greenness until frost, and is itself 
of suflicient merit, if there were no bloom of scarlet 
and gold on nodding stems, to commend the plant. 
Isn't this a good "weed" to choose? 

The worst dock neighborhood has been cleaned 
out again, and the space filled in part with the 
columbine and in part with the common blue flag, 
or German iris. The latter is vigorous, spreading, 
almost evergreen, and entirely better than bur- 
docks, isn't it? 

Two other spots in the half-shade are now 
given over to a certain plant of the strawberry 
family — Duchesnea indica. It has good foliage, and 
its httle yellow flowers are followed by humbug 
scarlet "fruits" that hang long, and are immune 
from human interference, because entirely taste- 
less. This is another and excellent chosen weed, 
and curiously enough, it is East Indian in origin, 
becoming naturalized in Europe, and in some way 
escaping the greenhouse "hanging-basket" so as 
to have acclimated itself here. For the toughest 
spot in my whole growing garden — the dry, root- 
filled slope under the big west horse-chestnut — I 
have started and growing a creeping ranunculus. 



182 MY GROWING GARDEN 



or buttercup, or crowfoot — Ranunculus repens. 
Grass is impossible for this spot, but I have an 
idea that the creeping buttercup may find the 
place endurable, if not congenial. If it does grow 
there, it is certainly no weed, for it will be very 
much a plant in place, and not out of place. Yet 
an authority on weeds — Harold C. Long — classes 
this as "one of the worst weeds of arable lands!" 

One formerly weedy corner of sterile ground I 
have filled with Bocconia cordata, a perennial 
growing to four or five feet, and with good foliage, 
flowers and seed-pods. It is not a proper thing to 
plant in a small garden, unless the roots are fenced 
in by concrete or slate; for they spread rapidly, 
and each little yellow rootlet that breaks off is 
another plant in a hurry. It takes care now of 
the weeds. 

A fine yellow evening primrose that blooms all 
day, making for several weeks a sheet of clear 
lemon-yellow, is another chosen weed. It spreads 
by creeping roots, and will overrun any location; 
but it is easily "weeded out" when it gets too far, 
and it will crowd out all ordinary sunshine weeds. 
1 am trying a half-dozen locations for it. 

Sweet william will seed itself and keep on, and 
it is another of the pervasive plants that I am 
naturalizing in spots. (By the way, does Mrs. 



CHOOSING YOUR OWN WEEDS 18S 



Gentle Reader notice that nice word — "natural- 
ize?" It means making a favorite plant a "weed," 
but it sounds much more elegant!) And I have 
mentioned in other chapters the sweet tobacco and 
the cosmos as controllable, chosen, "naturahzed" 
weeds, quite able to hold their own, and some more. 
Either makes a superb ground cover, and neither 
is deterred by poor ground. 

It is almost sacrilege, I fear, to speak of using 
climbing roses as weeds. But I have done it; and 
thusly. The south border or hedge-line of Breeze 
Hill garden is a curve of nearly six hundred feet in 
length. It is marked by a common barberry hedge, 
and outside down to the sidewalk space, and from 
that to the lower street, honeysuckle has been first 
a ground cover, and then a dominating weed. On 
the street side it is very fine and beautiful, but on 
the hedge side it had begun to climb and to choke 
even the lusty barberries. I had it rooted out com- 
pletely on this side, and in its place, about ten 
feet apart, I have set home-raised plants of Lady 
Gay, Alberic Barbier, W. C. Egan, Wichuraiana 
and CUmbing American Beauty roses. They were 
strung along the slope, and a little attention paid 
to pegging down the long branches. In one season 
the slope was fairly well covered, and the bloom 
show was something to see! When the mat of 



184 MY GROWING GARDEN 



foliage has the strength of a year or two more of 
growth, I anticipate the exclusion of the many 
undesirable weeds that have made this slope hard 
to keep in order. 

Such has been the weed experience of this grow- 
ing garden. From being at the mercy of undesira- 
ble plants, extensively naturalized, I have come 
to be master of some that are most desirable, and 
the making at home of which is a pleasant task. 
I shall expect each coming garden year to give me 
knowledge of at least one plant able to qualify in 
the chosen-weed class. 



Plate XXXIII. "The long border of nicotiana and African 
marigold ... is now in perfection." (See page 185.) 



CHAPTER XII— NOVEMBER 



PUTTING THE GARDEN TO SLEEP 

BUT the garden doesn't want to go to sleep! 
The "taps" were sounded for it in a sharp 
frost in the last October week, but the yet 
warm ground pushes up through the live plant 
roots a strong impulse to keep right on. And so 
the garden does; it keeps on. The dahlias were 
discouraged by the first frost, and other frosts 
coming early in this Thanksgiving month have 
put out of business a few of the annuals; but there 
are plenty left to keep the garden gay. 

Those great zinnias and the brilliant salvias 
are yet happy, the cosmos is a pink-and-white 
cloud, with ground snowy with its fallen petals, 
and the long border of nicotiana and African 
marigold that has followed the June show of 
poppies is now in perfection. More than eighty 
feet it runs, with a background of the now redden- 
ing Japanese barberry hedge, and the sweet 
tobacco opens its regular evening contribution of 
white flowers well above it. The foliage of the 
marigold, no less than its showy orange and yellow 

(185) 



186 MY GROWING GARDEN 



flowers, makes the front of the border fine to see. I 
have cut armful after armful of the great marigold 
stems for decoration, and yet one can see no lessen- 
ing of the border's truly golden glow. 

Here is a good example of what may be done 
with annuals in one year's round. First, the 
December sowing of forty cents' worth of Shirley 
poppy seed, with its fine June result as previously 
detailed in these pages; then the transplanting of 
the nicotiana plants that had volunteered from 
last year without cost, and of the marigolds that a 
ten-cent packet of seed provided; and now we have 
had two months of the fine fall display. The soon- 
to-arrive "black frost" will cut down this mass of 
foliage and flowers in time to have the border 
cleared, manured and dug, in preparation for next 
spring's new planting. Fifty cents in money 
expenditure, a few hours of garden work, and about 
fifty thousand flowers for parts of a whole season ! 
The one unpurchasable item, that of thoughtful 
planning to get this effect, goes with the unsellable 
satisfaction that the effect was obtained. The 
latter important item is increased by the pleasure 
this display has given to very many passers-by; 
for any garden satisfaction of the eye that is not 
shared is a poor sort. 

The berry plants are now most pleasing; I mean 



PUTTING THE GARDEN TO SLEEP 187 



those shrubs we grow not so much for their flowers 
as for their fruit. Of these, our present favorite 
is the "snowberry," which is well named; for its 
lovely white-berried branches hang as if weighted 
down with snow. Some of the cornuses and 
viburnums are now in showy fruit, in a corner of the 
older shrubs; and when I have sufficiently profited 
by the Arnold Arboretum bulletins, I can have a 
much finer summer and fall berry show.* 

The hardy chrysanthemums that began their 
showing in October complete it in early November, 
and then the flowers hang long, despite frosts, 
unless there happens what came one November 
second Sunday. A warm rain was followed imme- 
diately by a bitter wind bearing on its breath a tem- 
perature of twenty -two degrees, which simply froze 
in the 'mums and everything else, encasing the 
flowers in solid ice. But that was only once, and it 
is good garden philosophy to run chances in Novem- 
ber. I remember visiting the little village of Cash- 
town, in this state, to inquire about the chrysan- 
themum ways of it — ^for 'mum-growing is there a 
village function, and they "do" the flowers as well 
as the city florists, selling them to sustain the civic- 

*As I have ho frequently in these pages referred to the Arnold Arboretum 
bulletins, I think I ought here to say that anyone may have them who 
addresses that institution at Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, sending along 
one dollar for the season's issues. 



188 MY GROWING GARDEN 



improvement league and to do other desirable 
things for the community. Without glass protec- 
tion, they certainly do run chances, and employ 
expedients, as I understood when the husband of 
one of the flower-women confided in me thus: ''I 
don't mind takin' up the settin'-room carpet, to 
put over the dinged posies, an' I didn't fuss when 
she took the comfort off the bed one cold night, but 
I drew the line when she sent me in for my Sunday 
overcoat!" But I understood from the smiling 
wife that she saved the 'mums! 

Every morning when I hurry before breakfast 
to the garden and find that the white mist I have 
seen from my window has not frozen in the shelter 
of the great arborvitse hedge, I'm thankful for 
another day of bloom and its beauty. The flowers 
owe me no more; I have been well paid, fully 
paid, for all I have done; and this extension 
is in the nature of an encore to which I have no 
real right, but which I am very glad to have 
accorded me. 

The feast of vegetables continues, but it is natu- 
rally waning. The last of the sweet corn was on 
the table on the eighth day of the month, and that 
means that we have had it continually since July 
eighteenth — almost seventeen weeks of enjoyment 
of the best of vegetables ! Anyone may do as well 



PUTTING THE GARDEN TO SLEEP 189 



who will give thought to the succession he desires, 
and proper cultivation to the corn he plants. 

There were yet bush limas early in the month, 
and upon the poles have matured a considerable 
quantity of beans that will be useful in winter. 
Carrots, salsify, and the chicory roots from w^hich 
I hope to force the "French endive" for salad in 
winter are ready to store in our ''root cellar" or 
in outside pits. The celery is yet growing vigor- 
ously, and it will not be dug until there is a cold- 
wave flag flying. The blanching is being done by a 
paper contrivance, slipped over the top, and of 
course allowing the upper leaves to protrude. It 
seems a clever and labor-saving device; though it 
has been difficult for me to get into my head the 
knowledge that it is not the touch of earth against 
the celery plants, but the exclusion of hght by any 
means, that ''blanches" celery and makes it tender. 

Celery is a favorite vegetable in this family, 
and it seems a favorite of this growing garden, in 
which it does well. This year I have grown several 
sorts for comparison, and by next month it will be 
possible to get our own opinions. We have been 
eating some Golden Self -blanching, but only after 
it had had also the proper treatment to make it 
tender; for I long ago discovered that color or its 
absence in celery did not relate very closely to 



190 MY GROWING GARDEN 



flavor, tenderness or that crispness which makes 
such a difference. I have had handsomely yellow 
stalks that were stringy, tough and undesirable; 
and I have broken thick, green stems full of delight- 
fully ""nutty" interior. "Handsome is as hand- 
some tastes," in our celery consideration. 

November is the bulb-planting month. This 
year we have at Breeze Hill largely increased the 
preparations for spring bloom in the use of various 
narcissi, or daffodils. My visits to Hunt's bulb 
garden last spring gave notes for extending the 
show that we have heretofore had only from 
Emperor, Empress, and Poeticus — after, of course, 
the early Golden Spur. These excellent sorts are 
of but two classes in the great family — ^Trumpet 
and Poeticus. I found lovely flowers, quite dis- 
tinct, in the Incomparabilis, Barrii and Leedsii 
sections, and also, to my satisfaction, that they 
could be had at no great cost. It was interesting 
to see that while the daffodils of high degree, at 
one to ten dollars per bulb, were usually very 
beautiful or very large, or very both, they were not 
the only large and beautiful and desirable varieties. 
There was no repetition of my peony experience ! 

Consequently I have this month gotten into the 
ground in several locations some twelve hundred 
daffodil bulbs, placed with the idea of having them 



PUTTING THE GARDEN TO SLEEP 191 



paint themselves into the spring pictures, and there- 
after naturaHze into the edges of the lawn, not to be 
meddled with until in two or three years they have 
crowded themselves with their own increase. In 
addition, there have been little colonies set in the 
north border of the formal garden, including ten to 
twenty-five each of some different and rarer sorts, 
to be more closely under observation, as well as 
to fit into the spring picture. 

Another bulb preparation includes tulips that 
are "different." One visit to Mr. Hunt's garden 
was at the time when there were blooming not only 
some wonderful Darwin tulips, but no less won- 
derful flowers of the Breeder, Bybloem and Bizarre 
classes, and some dainty "botanical" varieties as 
well. I had never dreamed of such subdued rich- 
ness of tulip color as I saw there early one morning, 
with the sun slanting its rays into their dew-jeweled 
cups ! I knew of rich scarlet, and clear yellow, and 
deep crimson, and bright pink, and such pleasing 
colors and tints; but the soft tones of buff, orange, 
bronze, deep purple and smoky yellow-brown were 
new to me as tulip colors. These, Mr. Hunt 
explained, were the twentieth-century equivalent 
of the tulips that had so excited fanciers in Holland, 
and in England generations ago, but which had not 
been pushed in the American market. Are we of 



192 MY GROWING GARDEN 



Uncle Sam's children not able to appreciate and 
admire these refined shades as well as our British, 
Dutch and German cousins? I think so; and I'm 
hoping to have some pilgrimages to my growing 
garden next spring to see the tulips there planted 
in the borders, in careful thought of color-con- 
tiguity and with the fine background of the old 
evergreen hedge. 

The *'species" or botanical tulips I may fail 
with, since they are known to be impatient of 
unsuitable places, and I have — as yet — no rock- 
garden to provide root-coolness for them. But 
I'm trying; and that is all I can do. 

It would take too much space to tell here the 
story of the garden wall at Breeze Hill, and why 
and how it grew. It was, and is, part of the 
development of the idea, and my slowness to see, 
my lack of foresight, have made it more expensive 
and less satisfactory than it ought to be. It is 
just possible that it will fall down, in part, if I 
may take notice from certain suspicious cracks in 
the careless masonry. If it does, I shall be pocket- 
sorry and garden-glad; for when it goes up again, 
on the very same lines, it will be a really truly 
garden wall, with deep crevices for rock plants, 
and a certain-sure foundation. I have been the 
victim of the mason; I hope to be his master, next 



Plate XXXIV. "On either side the garden entrance a fine red 
cedar." (See page 193.) 



PUTTING THE GARDEN TO SLEEP 193 



time, and to impress upon his Dutch stoHdity the 
idea that I am to have what I want in a wall if he 
is to have what he wants in pay for erecting one ! 

But this November I have celebrated that wall 
by planting at its western face, on either side the 
garden entrance, a fine red cedar, or "juniper" as 
we used to call it as a Christmas tree. These cedars 
seem to stand there as posts of a gateless and 
hospitable entrance, and I like their slim green- 
ness. And I have planted along the wall, soon to 
cover it if it does not fall, the fine evergreen vine 
Evonymus radicans. It is a dinger, and its neat 
foliage is right for these limestone boulders. 

All the month the ground is workable, and much 
transplanting has been done, as well as much pre- 
paring for the hurried spring. It seems time, even 
ahead of a killing frost, to put the garden to sleep, 
and I have not hesitated to cut off tops on plants 
I want to move, and thus to prepare for the win- 
ter's rest. As I have written, many hundreds of 
brown bulbs have been put to sleep in the ground, 
and wherever I can clear up a bed or border, it is 
carefully mulched with loose manure, as protection 
for the winter. Not yet may I cover everything, 
for it seems best to wait until a little frost hardens 
the ground over the bulbs, ere the protection 
is apphed. 

M 



194 MY GROWING GARDEN 



Bean-poles are pulled up, tomato-stakes col- 
lected, leaves raked away — but not many have 
yet fallen — and every bit of trash that can be 
rotted is taken to the compost heap, which is 
once carefully turned and thoroughly wet during 
the month. 

But now comes a snow flurry, and more nights 
with hght frosts. The autumn color, often rather 
flat and monotonous in this Susquehanna valley, 
begins to be notable here, and a new garden glows 
before our eyes. The contrasts are striking, and 
on every side the eye is entranced with nature's 
final burst of color. Here are the lilacs and the 
mound of honeysuckle at the carriage step, in full, 
deep, rich and glowing summer green, untouched 
by frost, and with here and there in the honey- 
suckle a dainty and almost super-sweet flower. 
The arborvitae hedge has a brown undertone to 
its dull green, but next to it there flames a dog- 
wood, crimson in foliage and scarlet in fruit, and 
a Viburnum tomentosum, in deeper crimson. Of 
course my huckleberries, little though they are as 
yet, are showing the fall blood-red foliage that is 
but one of their merits, while not far away there 
are spireas and other shrubs in full summer 
foliage of green. 

In the Arboretum bed are some cotoneasters. 



PUTTING THE GARDEN TO SLEEP 195 



low and compact shrubs new to me until recently. 
Their small foUage is deep and glossy green, 
flecked here and there with rich crimson, to which 
hue it will all turn soon, I infer. On that garden 
wall the Ampelopsis Engelmannii is flaunting 
scarlet banners, while the nearby hanging shoots 
of the Wichuraiana rose are yet in entire green. 
The roses in the "species bed" are bare, save one, 
Rosa Carolina, which is rampant in young shoots 
and brightest green. 

The big oakleaves of Hydrangea quercifolia 
have taken on a peculiar and striking bronzy hue, 
like nothing else. Those two large Buffum pear 
trees are in blossom again, seemingly, but it is a 
bloom of fire, for the foliage is indescribably 
ablaze in red and yellow and bronze. 

Rather suddenly the horse-chestnuts turn yel- 
low in foliage, and the great west tree becomes a 
clear and lucent color that sends a glow into the 
nearby windows. Hardly a leaf had it dropped 
until one morning toward Thanksgiving, after the 
first real freeze, it shed all its immense mass of 
foliage in about three hours, appearing by noon 
cleanly bared for winter. 

Of all the autumn color show, the part furnished 
by the barberry hedge is the finest. Beautiful 
every hour in the year, its fall changing is an 



196 MY GROWING GARDEN 



intensification of that beauty. The change begins 
early, and is in progress slowly for many weeks, 
until suddenly it glows in a deep scarlet-crimson, 
amidst which its clear scarlet fruit, hanging in 
graceful sprays under the arching twigs, is the 
accented note. What a shrub it is! Hardy, ser- 
viceable, able to endure shade and yet to revel in 
sun; needing no trimming at all, holding interest 
all the time; getting along in poor ground but 
rejoicing abundantly if better treated; is it not 
the one best low-growing shrub? 

So closes the month, in a glow of autumn color, 
fading slowly, dropping softly to the ground. It is 
a joyous ending to a lovely season in this growing 
garden. 



CHAPTER XIII— DECEMBER 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 

THE Christmas month, m this dimate, is not 
one of garden growth, to any great extent. 
It is a time of expectation, in that a freeze- 
up is presumably imminent on any December 
night. It is a time for protection, as well; for after 
that first freeze-up, which ideally should be a mild 
one, it is orthodox to tuck in the covers, draw up 
the blankets, and make sure that the garden plant- 
folk are all "comfy" for the winter. It is this pro- 
cess that promotes retrospect, and it is a queer 
gardener who is not also continually thinking of 
the future, of next year's prospect. 

But December is not all bleak winter here, by 
any means. The earlier days are often mild and 
pleasant, and the hardier remainders of the gar- 
den year take prompt advantage of any sun- 
encouragement. During the first week of the 
month I have found scabious, candytuft and gail- 
lardias in comfortable bloom. Of course I expect 
to see pansies opening in every month in the year, 
and have not now, nor often, been disappointed. 

(197) 



198 MY GROWING GARDEN 



Then the wallflowers, bless them! do not regard 
winter as of any importance until at last Jack 
Frost repeatedly freezes them into insensibility. 
One year the ground was unfrozen when the first 
deep December snow arrived, covering everything 
with its soft mantle. There followed weeks of the 
sharp steady cold of an ideal winter; but in Jan- 
uary a thaw set in that in a day cut down the snow 
blanket to a mere gauze sheet. What was my sur- 
prise to find that the sinldng snow uncovered wall- 
flowers that had seemingly opened their blooms 
under it, and were in entire perfection when the 
sun reached them ! 

And on Christmas day in one of the happy 
Breeze Hill garden years I have found and gloat- 
ingly taken to the home-guests that day assembled 
flowers of the pansy, the English daisy and the 
wallflower. These latest flowers are doubly appre- 
ciated, and have an appeal not possessed by the 
great rich greenhouse roses one buys. 

So long as the ground can be handled and 
worked, we keep at it. Early in December I have 
marked out, in prospect for next and later years, a 
new walk across that part of the west garden last 
devoted to a potato failure, and since under such 
further amelioration of its soil as will give me 
hope of accomplishing real gardening on it another 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 199 



year. The marking out has been made permanent 
by the use of iron-pipe posts instead of the wooden 
stakes, so easy to drive, so brittle in the winter, 
and so Hkely to have disappeared next spring. I 
get from a junk-dealer such pieces of three-quarter 
or inch iron pipe as he has in his possession, and 
with a hack-saw or a pipe-cutter quickly reduce the 
incidental lengths to an even size of fifteen inches. 
These seldom cost more than a cent each, and they 
serve the marking purpose both well and perma- 
nently. It is one of the garden jokes to report the 
whispered question of a visitor, who, seeing the 
pipe stakes of the curving walk, not yet driven 
down even with the ground, said in my ear, 
"I suppose those pipes are part of your irrigating 
system.^" 

I have to deal in this whole home place with a 
piece of ground that is not rectangular, but a 
segment of a circle; and as the house was origi- 
nally placed with reference to a road since aban- 
doned, and the present street plan has no relation 
to that road, some perplexing problems have 
appeared. Of course, since Mr. Manning supplied 
me with the idea that the garden axis had to be 
that of the house, there is a base-line to work from. 
The nearest street-corner right-angle provides 
another base-Une, and the desirable retention of 



200 MY GROWING GARDEN 



the old hedges, several of them on curves, has not 
lessened the complexity of the layout. It took me 
several hours to connect the house axis with the 
not parallel street line by means of the new walk 
above mentioned, because I had to construct a 
curve of several radii — and I certainly am no 
engineer ! 

The process was to drive in Httle wooden pegs 
every three feet on what seemed to be the right 
curve, and then to more completely visualize this by 
drawing along the stakes a white garden line. The 
curve was not at all right; and then followed shift- 
ing of the stakes many times until my eye was 
satisfied. (My printer associates hint that it is 
unreasonably hard to satisfy that eye, by the way !) 
Then the iron-pipe stakes were driven along the 
convex side of the curve, three feet apart, and a 
foot deep, leaving three inches out of the ground 
to serve until the grass that will be sown in early 
spring has completely defined the walk. 

The same sort of markers have been used for 
garden beds and borders all over the place, driving 
them even with the ground, so that a lawn-mower 
will not notice them, but an investigating finger 
will, when it is desirable to make sure of hues or 
corners or curves. 

Now that the leaves are all down, I find where 




Plate XXXV. "The barberry hedge, now purely lovely . . 
The rhododendrons, snow-bound, look happy." 
(See page 205.) 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 201 



the mean oyster-shell scale has hidden upon cer- 
tain lilacs and dogwoods. He and his million- 
family are given an overcoat of strong lime- 
sulphur, which I wish they may enjoy! I find 
here and there insect egg-masses, which are 
abolished. The trees trained on the espalier are cut 
loose for the winter, so that we may get back of 
the tied-up stems with spray fluid. The stems of 
the peach and the apples trees are examined for 
borers at and below the ground-Hne, and these 
are tickled to death, when found by knife or 
pointed wire. 

The sun-dial ivy is a problem. I like the Eng- 
lish ivy, and it is just the thing to cover the brown- 
stone pedestal on which is supported the hour- 
marking device. Unfortunately, the ivy has 
frozen back to disreputability every year, which 
means that for about five growing months the 
pedestal is either uncovered or raggedly covered. 
Last year, therefore, I concluded to say farewell to 
the ivy, and to depend for sun-dial greenery upon 
the definitely hardy Evonymus radicans, a most 
excellent evergreen climber. But I could not be 
hard-hearted enough to tear out the ivy roots 
when I planted the evonymus, so I merely cut off 
the old bedraggled stems of it. Behold! it has 
possessed the pedestal, covered up the evonymus. 



202 MY GROWING GARDEN 



and several times during the summer I have had to 
restrain its ambition to cover the dial itself by 
cutting back its exuberant branches. Now that 
winter is impending, I am anxious to carry it 
through substantially unharmed. Previous pro- 
tection by cedar boughs has been inadequate; and, 
after much consideration, I have wrapped it about 
with burlap, loosely applied, and most unpleasing 
to see. The spring will show — ^what.^^ 

All the vegetables are out of danger now, 
either in securely covered trenches, or in a cellar 
that I can hold at close to forty degrees Fahren- 
heit all winter. The ground from which they were 
lifted has been raked smooth, and if I had time 
would all be manured and dug before freezing. I 
have had time to get ready a "row" for the earliest 
peas and spinach; and my son has looked spring in 
the eye in making a new sort of concrete coldframe 
range from which he expects interesting results; 
but that is too much of a story to tell before 
Christmas. 

With all there is to do in the hours that may be 
taken from the oflSce-desk at which is earned a 
living and the money to play with a growing gar- 
den, there yet remains some time and much 
inclination for retrospect and prospect. As I walk 
about, my forward-looking mind sees many things 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 203 



to do, and it draws pictures for me on that flexible 
canvas, my imagination. But today it has harked 
back to the first December, five years ago, and it 
bids me dwell on memories rather than on antici- 
pations. I see what the years have worked out for 
me, under God's sunshine and rain, on this once 
forbidding and now attractive spot. I see how my 
vague ideals have been clarified, how my hardly 
less vague desires have been changed, in the years 
of outdoor effort and thought. I am keenly sensible 
of the kindness of better gardeners who have been 
patient with my crudities, recognizing, perhaps, the 
inner striving in the right direction. My mistakes ! 
How many they have been, and how vexatious 
when discovered, until I learned to recognize them 
as actual onward steps, to laugh at them and their 
maker, and to arrive at the knowledge that I was 
quite certain to keep on making garden errors, but 
might hope, with sufficient thoughtful humility, 
to avoid making the same error twice. 

Looking backward, I note the transition from 
reading books about gardens to doing work in one 
of them, and how it gradually came to pass that 
I read less, and only of standard substantialities 
that might be termed principles, because I found 
that I must work out my own garden salvation, 
and work it out, if not with fear and trembling. 



204 MY GROWING GARDEN 



certainly with an open mind and a humble dis- 
position. If I may be pardoned the personality of 
it, I may say, too, that the garden-work stopped a 
rather busy pen for a while. How could I take 
time to write of anything — gardening or printing, 
civics or photography — when there was such an 
open volume to read as I walked and worked and 
thought Of this kind of reading I have done much, 
and profited by it some at least, in these garden 
years. Now that something has moved me to 
write again, I am but talking with whoever reads, 
feeling hopeful that those who have followed the 
fortunes of this growing garden along through the 
months have arrived at some sympathy with and 
understanding of my plain statement of happen- 
ings and hopes, of errors and satisfactions. 

In this retrospect, I observe that much has been 
done at Breeze Hill, from the standpoint of the 
gardenerless-garden and the scanty pocketbook, 
though it would be little indeed in comparison 
with what many men of large means have accom- 
plished in less time. Such men's gardens interest 
me to look at, and in part to profit by; but I take 
it more men of little means who ought to make 
grow a garden of their own will see these words 
than will millionaires whose very weight of wealth 
makes an individual garden almost impossible for 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 205 



them. So my measure of accomplishment in work- 
ing over this run-down old place is only to be con- 
sidered in connection with the expenditure of time 
and money possible to many another man who will 
be made a better worker at his business or profes- 
sion if he will undertake the garden cure. 

There has been a heavy snow, and I write look- 
ing west through Lovers' Lane, where I see the 
planting of rhododendrons along the old-looking 
but quite recent stone walk that has taken the 
place of the weedy, rutty farm lane of five years 
ago. The rhododendrons, snow-bound as they are, 
look happy, and are happy; and I know that at 
their feet, and along the walk on both sides are 
safely tucked away scores of woods favorites in 
this place reserved for American natives only. 
Just around to the right there is, I also know, a 
planting of daffodils that will surely look better 
than did the poke-weed that overran the same 
place five years ago. To the right also, and follow- 
ing the line of the old hedge that has been petted 
and trimmed and fertilized all I dare, more and 
other daffodils will come, and later Easter lilies 
and later yet fine little yellow button chrysanthe- 
mums, where reigned supreme dock and nettles 
in the old days. 

Looking southwest, I see the youngest part of 



206 MY GROWING GARDEN 



the garden, with its borders and the Arboretum 
bed, its grass driveway, its almost concealed range 
of coldframes facing the winter sun, its new plant- 
ing of pet evergreens. That was a wreck of dead 
pear trees five years ago! Beyond, I see the bar- 
berry hedge, now purely lovely because of the 
way in which it carries its snow load, and I remem- 
ber that when I came here there were fences that 
were offenses — great scroll-sawed contortions of 
pine boards — because they said plainly, ''Stay 
out!" This hedge, which is only a marking line 
after all, says "Look in !" 

Walking out in the snow — and I love it more 
than I did that first winter — I turn into the formal 
garden which has taken the place of two broken- 
down buildings — an ice-house and a greenhouse — 
that made the place forlorn when I came. In it I 
see the rose-arbor, now trebly covered with a mat 
of prosperous rose-twigs, snugly protected with 
the unused Christmas trees I have picked up, and 
thick with this clinging snow. Under these nearby 
flat white expanses I know there are perennial 
plants of many sorts, ready to be born again in 
spring; and they grow in what was formerly the 
foundation of that greenhouse. 

A bit farther along, and there is a glimpse of the 
fruit-garden, looking clean and trim, and also 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 207 



ready to serve me beyond my deserts when its 
time comes. And this has taken the place of an 
abandoned, overrmi, ridgy, dying vineyard of 
five years ago ! 

All this change; and yet it is, and looks like, 
an old place. Not only had I a memory of my 
own old home place to restrain me, but I had the 
admonitions of Mr. Manning, to prevent the sort 
of horror I have so often seen with sadness — the 
cutting down of everything, so as to "start afresh." 
Here, instead, the old features have been zeal- 
ously preserved, and the new plantings and pla- 
cings adapted to them. The result is a mature and 
home-ly (please note the hyphen, and what it 
means) beauty that could not have been had in a 
generation if we had "started afresh." 

The retrospect is pleasing, at least to us of the 
growing garden, in and with which we also have 
grown and gained in spirit and in health. Now 
what of the prospect? 

These vista plant-pictures are to be perfected, 
so that they will tell us in every season more of the 
goodness of the God of the outdoors. This impHes 
study, effort, fruitful mistakes, trials, changes. 
Then I want here gathered, not in a museum fash- 
ion of orderly display, but as part of a living and 
growing garden, all the good plants, particularly 



208 



MY GROWING GARDEN 



of Pennsylvania, that can be happily located. I 
want also the less well-known shrubs, especially 
of fascinating West China and mysterious Thibet, 
to show here to visiting Americans what they may 
additionally have of loveUness in leaf and flower. 
I want good fruits — I have already supplemented 
those fine fall-bearing Progressive strawberries 
with a red raspberry said to come along in company 
— and new roses that are worth while. 

The vegetable part of the garden I hope to see 
take cognizance of other things that we ought to 
like, and to repeat many times the success of the 
kohlrabi. I hope constantly to improve the tex- 
ture and the productivity of the soil. I want to 
some time have really good lawns — for it may have 
been noticed that I have kept quiet about lawns, 
for reasons, many reasons — and I dream of grass 
drives as deep and velvety and wear-resisting as 
those of my old acquaintance Olcott in Con- 
necticut. 

And I must not forget my dream of a little 
well-placed rock-garden, in which may be made at 
home a host of lovely plants that demand cool 
roots, and a chance to nestle under the edge of a 
boulder. There is a place for it, I think; and also a 
place for just a bit of a water garden, well cir- 
cumstanced, in which I may see bloom the lovely 




Plate XXXVI. "The-fruit garden, looking clean and trim. 
The rose-arbor . . . thick with this clinging snow." 
(See page 206.) 



RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 209 



hardy water lilies, and around which may be gath- 
ered some wet-footed plants. 

There are two old cherry trees in the front lawn 
that are dying. At the foot of the most decrepit 
is growing the Excelsa rose previously mentioned, 
which in one season has mounted about fifteen feet 
(as shown on the frontispiece), and ought in due 
course to swing its crimson garlands in the breeze 
from the topmost remaining limbs another year. 
This is the trial; and if it seems a success, the other 
old veteran will change its bearing in June from 
cherries to roses, or mayhap wistaria. 

Other things are to be done. The good plants 
I want to naturalize as "weeds" are to be selected 
and placed; the iris planting is to be made more 
representative; a peony garden will come if 
"shekels" appear for it; some North Carolina 
mountain evergreen shrubs — the leucothoe, the 
galax, and certain azalea-rhododendrons — are to 
fill a corner that will be home for them, I hope; a 
long hedge of chmbers, not roses, is to form a 
semi-screen for the west garden. Thus, and other- 
wise, the garden is to grow; for it is, and has been, 
a true growing garden. And I have thought it 
worth while, in planning and planting, to take into 
account what would happen if again this old place 
were abandoned. God willing, I believe that even 

N 



210 MY GROWING GARDEN 



then it would continue to be a growing garden. I 
should like no better epitaph than that it might be 
said, after I have passed along to other labors, 
that here dwelt a man who loved a garden, who 
lived in and grew with it, and who yet looks upon 
it, even from afar, as a garden growing for all who 
love the beauties of God's green earth. 



INDEX 



Abelia grandiflora commended, 
136. 

Aconite, Wilson's, in bloom, 161. 
Aluminum wire for trellis, 59. 
Alyssum, yellow, blooming, 84. 
Ampelopsis Engelmannii in 

autumn, 195. 
Anchusa not admired, 132. 
Anemone, Japanese, in bloom, 

161; illus. facing 161. 
Annuals, result in one year, 186; 

in September, 155. 
Anthracnose on sycamore, 53. 
Apple, Bismarck, discussed, 147; 

Smokehouse, special planting, 

63. 

Apple blooms, when to spray, 77; 
illtis. facing 77. 

Apricot in bloom, 65; fruiting, 114. 

April rain, value of, 67. 

Arabis in bloom, 84. 

Arborvitseas in snow, 10; illm, 
facing 9. 

Arctotis grandis, 166. 

Arnold Arboretum mentioned, 42, 
84, 159; purpose of, 61; bul- 
letins mentioned, 187. 

Artemisia lactiflora blooming, 135. 

Aster beetle combated, 130. 

Asters, China, 129 (illiis. facing 
128) ; King varieties, 152. 



Asters, hardy, treatment of, 152. 
Autumn color, a feature, 172; 

dull, 194; glowing, 194; plant 

for, 41. 
Autumn not melancholy, 3. 

Bailey, Dr. L. H., mentioned, 175. 
Barberry, common, blooming, 84. 
Barberry, Thunberg, hedge 

blooming, 80; reddening, 185; 

sleet-covered, 28 (illus. facing 

29) ; snow-covered, 206. 
Berried plants, 187. 
Bible, garden quotation, 105. 
Blackberries bearing, 113; beauty 

of bloom (illiLs. facing 84); 

trained on wires, 114. 
Blackbirds a nuisance, 115. 
Bloodroot, 15. 
Blue spirea blooming, 134. 
Bocconia cordata, 129, 182. 
Boltonia discussed, 152. 
Border of nicotiana and marigold, 

185. 

Borers combated, 37. 

Breeze Hill has a name, 4; shape 

of, 12. 
Buddleia discussed, 136. 
Bulbs planted in November, 190. 
Butterfly bush discussed, 137. 
Button-weed, 178. 



212 



INDEX 



Calendula, in contrast, 167. 

Campanula Medium, in combina- 
tion, 100. 

Cannas, persisting, 168; Wintzer 
varieties, 86, 102. 

CapseUa, 177, 179. 

Carnations, Margaret, early sow- 
ing, 26. 

Carriage approach staked out, 20. 

Caryopteris incana {M astacau' 
thus), 134. 

Catalogues, lure of, 21, 26. 

Cedars, Red, planted, 193; illv^. 
facing 193. 

Celery, planted, 112; in Novem- 
ber, 189. 

Ceratostigma blooming, 153. 

Cherries fruiting, 97. 

Chinese shrubs, 62. 

Chromatic balance of seasons, 123. 

Chrysanthemums, an October fea- 
ture, 162; at Cashtown, 187; 
varieties mentioned, 162. 

Coldframe in sheltered spot, 20. 

Colorado blue spruce, 125. 

Color compensation of seasons, 
123. 

Columbine, finest strain, 23; Long- 
spurred, 101. 

Columbine, wild, as weed, 180. 

Conoclinium coelestinum, 133. 

Conodoguinet Creek, wild flowers 
along, 15. 

Corn, Rainbow, not admired, 125. 

Corn, sweet, satisfactory, 144; 
seventeen weeks of it, 188; 
transplanted, 110; varieties 
mentioned, 85. 



Cosmos, 185; in October, 163. 
Cotoneaster mentioned, 194. 
Crocuses blooming, 44, 64; illu^, 

facing 44. 
Currant bushes injured by scale, 

35. 

Cypnpedium acaule, 71. 

Daffodils in April, 66 {illu^. facing 
60); naturahzed, 190; illus., 
colored, facing 65. 

DahHas, May planting, 86; Per- 
plexing, 167. 

Daisy, English, in winter, 198. 

December, flowers in bloom, 197. 

Delphiniums, late bloom, 161. 

Delphiniums, perennial, bloom- 
ing, 122; satisfaction with, 133. 

Deutzias blooming, 83. 

Dianthus, late bloom, 167. 

Docks uprooted, 177. 

Dogwood in bloom, 83; men- 
tioned, 15. 

Dutchman's breeches, 15. 

Dynamite for cultivation, 30. 

Eagles Mere mentioned, 126. 
Elder, golden-leaved, 124; native, 
19. 

Engelmann spruce in native 
, haunt, 125. 

MscvXus parviflora in bloom, 
119. 

Espalier, details of, 54; fruiting, 

141 ; illv^. facing 140. 
Eupatorium ageratoides, 153. 
Eupatorium mentioned, 133. 
Evonymus radicans, 193, 201. 



INDEX 



213 



Failures to be confessed, 9. 

Farr, B. H., mentioned, 99. 

Fertilization needed, 29; not con- 
sidered, 29. 

Filipendula hexapetala, 135. 

Flicker drumming on roof, 116< 

Flower seeds germinating, 47. 

Forsythia blooming in April, 65 
{illiLS. in color, facing 65); 
forced, 21. 

Freeze-up in November, 187. 

Fruit flowers in May, 76. 

Fruit-garden, dwarf, 54 {illus. 
facing 124) ; in winter, 206. 

Fniit trees, summer pruning, 140; 
trained specimens, 54. 

Gaillardias, perennial, blooming, 
138. 

Garden, clearing up, 194; plan- 
ning, 14; tillage, 145. 

Garden in April, illus. facing 68; 
in August, facing 132. 

Gardens, imitative, 18. 

Garden without a gardener men- 
tioned, 204. 

Getting into the ground, 27. 

Gladioli, planted late, 101; late 
bloom, 166. 

Grapes, at Breeze Hill, history of, 
. 148; bagging the bunches, 114; 
Green Mountain ripening, 142; 
protecting from steel - blue 
beetle, 150; in bags, 168. 

Grass seed, understanding of, 25. 

Green manuring, importance of, 33. 

Helenium autumnale rubrum, 154. 
Hemlock, 16. 



Herbaceous plants in May, 84. 
Heuchera, 100. 

Hollyhock in bloom, 120; illtts. 

facing 113. 
Honesty in bloom, 84. 
Honeysuckle, Japan, on old stump, 

103; illus. facing 104. 
Horse-chestnuts, autumn color, 

195; dominating, 17; flowers, 

72 (illv^. facing 72); twigs in 

early spring, 27. 
Horse-chestnut, dwarf, in bloom, 

119. 

Humus, need for, 29. 
Hunt, Chester Jay, mentioned, 
191. 

Hydrangea arhorescens grandiflora 
blooming, 118, 158. 

Hydrangea quercijolia, 158; au- 
tumn color, 195. 

Hydrangea radiatamenivmed., 119. 

Hydrangeas worth while, 16. 

Hydrangeas, wrong use of, 174. 

Individual treatment, 8. 
Inventory of old place, 11. 
Iris, English, blooming, 100. 
Iris, German, as weed, 181; 

massed, 81. 
Iris, Japanese, blooming, 100; 

illus. facing 100. 
Iris, Spanish, blooming, 100. 
Iron-pipe posts, 199. 
Ivy, Enghsh, on sundial, 201. 

Kohlrabi, acquaintance made, 169. 

Laurel in bloom, 102. 
Lawns, fall recovery, 157. 



214 



INDEX 



Lawn work in spring, 60; view, 

illus. facing 176. 
Leaf-mold, cost of, 32. 
Lilac, buds in March, 27; from 

Bulgaria, 17; twig tone in 

spring, 42. 
Lilacs blooming, 82. 
Lilies, tiger, failure with, 131. 
Lilium candidum blooming, 101; L. 

Henryi, 131. 
Lima beans in use, 111. 
Linden in winter, 10; illrn, facing 

16. 

Love-in-a-mist, 165. 

Lovers' Lane, plants of, 70; 

spring flowers in, 65; wild 

flowers in, 65. 

MaliLS (Pyrus) fiorihunda in 

bloom, 77, 81. 
Manning, Warren H., mentioned, 

7, 153, 199, 207. 
Maple, Norway, blooming, 65. 
Marigold, African, 185; illus. 

facing 185. 
Markers, permanent, 199. 
May-apple, 15. 
Mertensia virginica, 15. 
Mitchella repens, 75. 
Mock oranges, a month of bloom, 

84. 

Monarda "Cambridge Scarlet" 

not admired, 134. 
Mourning Bride blooming, 166. 
Muck-pile commended, 31. 
Mulberry, first discovery, 14; 

long-fruiting, 114. 
Myrtle, blue, 79. 



Narcissi, in crescent border, 67; 

varieties, 66, 190. 
Narcissus, Golden Spur, blooming, 

66. 

National flower of America, 102. 
Nicotiana, 121, 140, 185; illiLS. 

facing 185. 
NigeUa, 165. 

Norway maples pervading, 5. 
Norway spruce as protection, 12; 

not American, 17. 
Novelties, how they happen, 22; 

trial of, 22. 
November flowers yet blooming, 

185. 

Pansies in winter, 198; natu- 
ralized, 163. 

Pansy as a perennial, 164. 

Peaches ripening, 147. 

Peach, Krummell, 147, 168, 169. 

Peas, beauty of bloom, 83; early 
maturing, 96; planting early, 45. 

Pennsylvania native shrubs pre- 
ferred, 16. 

Peonies, experience in selecting, 98. 

Peony, tenuifoUa, in bloom, 84. 

Perennials transplanted, 171. 

Pergola wrongly placed, 160. 

Periwinkle, blue, 79. 

Persimmon, overlooked, 10; cross- 
ing, 14; fruit, 13. 

Petunia, late bloom, 167; satis- 
factory, 155. 

Philadelphus, Avalanche, 103. 

Phlox divaricata, 15. 

Phlox Drummondiif mixture, 155. 

Phlox, hardy, not prosperous, 122. 



INDEX 



215 



Phytolacca as a weed, 177. 
Pictures in the open, living, 159; 

in plants, 38, 207. 
Pine, white, 16. 
Plant catalogues discussed, 41. 
Plant competition, 128. 
Planting, color consideration, 39. 
Planting, early, 49; for color 

value, 158; form consideration, 

39; inappropriate, 159; in varied 

exposures, 75. 
Plants out of place, 175. 
Plumbago blooming, 153. 
Plums, Japanese, in bloom, 65. 
Poison-ivy, treatment for, 176; 

uprooting, 176. 
Poke-weed destroyed, 176. 
Poppy, plume, 129. 
I*oppy> Shirley, in border, 97; 

illiLS. in color, facing 97. 
Portulaca blooming, 138. 
Potato, failure with, 107. 
Primrose, evening, 100; as a weed, 

182. 

Pussy willow, buds opening, 44. 
Pyrus {Malus) floribunda in 
bloom, 77, 81. 

Quinces in winter, 10. 

Radishes in April, 56; with coarse 
tails, 24. 

Ranunculus, creeping, as weed,181. 

Raspberries, 96, 113. 

Red-bud mentioned, 15. 

Rhododendron, CaroUna, 86; in 
snow, 205; maximum, in bloom, 
102, 117 {illus. facing 117); 
native, 18; planting, 72. 



Rhubarb, early forcing, 46. 
Robins at home, 115. 
Rock-garden desired, 208. 
Rose, "black spot," 127; Excelsa, 

climbing on cherry tree, 209; 

illus. color, frontispiece; Gruss 

an TepHtz, 157. 
Rose-garden, old, 89; -arbor in 

bloom, illiLS. facing 89. 
Rose-hedge not possible, 19; 

special treatment, 92. 
Roses, June high-point, 89; early 

planting, 50; in August, 127; 

varieties blooming, 95, 157, 158. 
Roses, climbing, as weeds, 183; 

named, 91, 183. 
Roses, rugosa hybrids, 19; bloom- 
ing, 94. 

Salvia patens blooming, 122, 167. 
Salvia, scarlet, 122, 154, 185. 
San Jos6 scale. Dr. Bailey's view, 
146. 

Scabiosa blooming, 166. 
Scale, oyster-shell, 201; San Jos6, 
146. 

Scilla in bloom, 64. 

Sedum spectabile blooming, 153. 

Shasta daisy blooming, 121. 

Shepherd's-purse, 177. 

Shrubs, blooming in June, 102; 
medium size preferred, 43; 
price and quality, 43; Septem- 
ber-blooming, 156. 

Skees in use, 20; illtts. facing 20. 

Small fruits in garden, 55. 

Snakeroot, white, 153. 

Snapdragons blooming, 154, 167. 



£16 



INDEX 



Snow, beauty of, 10. 

Soil, getting into early, 45. 

Sowing seeds in February, 26. 

Spirxa arguta, blooming, 66, 81; 
Henry i, 84; Van Houttei, 83; 
summer-blooming, 119. 

Spiraea Filipendula, 135. 

Spraying, beginning, 34; care 
required, 36, 79; for codHn- 
moth, 77; of sycamore, 53. 

Spray, lime-sulphur, 35. 

Spring, first signs of, 27, 44. 

Stokesia cyanea, 100. 

Strawberries blooming, 82; in 
September, 150; June high- 
point, 87; Progressive, 151, 168; 
wild, as weed, 181. 

Styrax japonica blooming, 102. 

Summer heliotrope discussed, 136. 

Sundial, covering, 201. 

Sweet Peas blooming, 119; early 
sowing, 57; training, 58. 

Sweet William blooming, 98; nat- 
uralized, 182. 

Sycamore in snow, 11) illus. fac. 1. 

Syringa pinnatifoUa, 63. 

Tillage, importance of, 145. 
Tobacco, sweet, 183. 
Tomato plants, early, 47. 
Transplanting at any time, 51; 

method of, 76. 
Trash fire condemned, 31. 
Tree-doctoring, 52; illus. fac. 63. 
Trellis for fruits, 59. 
Trillium grandifiorum, 15. 
Tuhps, 85, 191, 192. 



Valerian blooming, 100. 

Vegetable -garden, illus. facing 
109, 168, 169. 

Vegetables, as gifts, 109; canning 
in the home, 171; experimen- 
tal, 85; for decoration, 106; in 
July, 109; in November, 188; 
need for preserving, 170; pleas- 
ing appearance, 142; protected, 
202; specializing in, 111; suc- 
cession, 144. 

Verbenas persisting, 166. 

Vetch as green manure, 34. 

Vinca minor on stone steps, 79. 

Violet, blue, 180; EngUsh sweet, 
44, 180. 

Vistas planned, 38. 

Walks, laying out, 200. 
Wallflowers, 166, 198. 
Wall, garden, 192. 
Water-garden, 208. 
Watering devices, 171. 
Weed, definition of, 175. 
Weeds in lawn, 179. 
Wild flowers, collecting, 70; de- 
stroyed, 174; in May, 69. 
Wilson, E. H,, mentioned, 61, 131. 
Winter color, planting for, 41. 
Wintzer, Antoine, mentioned, 168. 

Yew, American, 75. 

Zmnias, giant, 139, 156, 186; 

illus. in color facing 156. 
Zinnia Haageana, blooming, 139, 

156. 



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